The Dark Bank Of The River
by Acid-Rush
Summary: COMPLETE Having lived separate lives for some time, Lara embarks on a mission as Kurtis is forced onto a journey of soul searching, until their stories are entwined by the universal force of Death.
1. Beginnings

**Ta Da! I return! For a long time I wanted to write another story but I couldn't think of anything. Then, a small personal screw up and some dark mornings in solitude waiting for the bus and hey presto, inspiration. I'm at my most creative when I'm living in metaphorical darkness, so it's a good job my life is usually a disaster.**

**Thankyou THANKYOU to everyone who reviewed the final chapters of my last piece, No Man's Land, and especially to those who reviewed right the way through the story. I really appreciate it and I'm so glad that you all enjoyed the last chapter so much. I knew that little twist would have you all going:-)**

**You don't need to have read my Home trilogy to understand this fic, though little references like the Takeshi's Castle scene will make more sense if you have. Teef, that bit's for you! Just know that Kurtis and Lara hit a bad patch but sorted things out, Kurtis went off to sort out some personal issues, Bryce currently hates Kurtis, and Kurtis had a hard time with the Lux Veritatis and his father.**

**This story was originally meant to premiere on Feb 14th for Lara's birthday, but it got delayed. I've rambled enough, on with the show!**

**The Dark Bank Of The River**

_To Kieron - Contentment is the enemy of invention_

_Beginning _

Kurtis Trent leant on the hotel balcony railing and stared out across the town. He took a drag of his cigarette, breathing in deeply, and then exhaled. The smoke mingled with the early morning fog, already shrouding the skyline into ghosts of silhouettes.

He thought for a moment, contemplating all that he had been through, all that had happened, finalising his thoughts that had been running all night.

"They say still waters run deep," he concluded to no one but himself. "I guess they're right."

Then he dropped his cigarette on the floor, stamped it out under his boot, and went inside to pick up his bags.

Three weeks earlier

_It was a cellar or basement of some kind, with grimy flagstones covered in decaying scraps of paper and clumps of dirt, and walls of brick marked with water stains and cobwebs. It was cold, quiet, the temperature and the silence crystal in their clarity, the only pure things about the place. _

_She stood there before him, impassive to his suffering. "Who are you?"_

"_What do you mean?" he begged, pleading with his eyes and imploring with his hands. "What do you want from me?" He was dirty, unkempt, cut, bruised and desperate for respite._

"_What do you want?" she asked._

"_I don't know what you mean!" he cried, but she did not react to his distress, only regarding him patiently, and in desperation he broke down into tears, his body sagging where he knelt on the floor. "Please!" he sobbed, looking up and reaching out to her, "Lara, please…", but she was gone and Kurtis was alone once more._

"_Please," he sobbed to the darkness, falling forwards and dropping his head to the dirt caked floor as his hands clawed at the unforgiving stone, "please…"_

Gasping, Lara Croft sat bolt upright in bed, finding herself sweating and panting from the nightmare. She stared around her into the darkness and then looked to her clock, the luminescent display marking 6am of a cold winter morning. Letting out a deep breath, she flopped back onto her pillow and wiped the sweat from her forehead. What a _horrible_ dream. How could she have just stood there and coldly ignored him when he'd obviously needed comfort so badly? Was it she that had done that to him? She shivered and shook her head harshly, trying to force the images from her mind. It was just a dream…she'd never do anything like that to anyone. It was _just_ a dream. Sighing sharply once again, she turned over onto her side and buried her head into the pillow, calming herself after the nightmare as she waited for the unwelcome inevitable.

Soon enough, the inevitable came, and Lara refused to react. Her bedroom door clicked open, creaked noisily as it was swung wide, and then fast footsteps clattered noisily over the wooden floor towards her. She was forced to open her eyes when a heavy weight landed squarely on top of her, forcing out all breath, and causing her to bend slightly at the waist, letting out a startled 'oof'.

"Bryce!" she complained, glaring up at him as he grinned down from where he lay above her, bouncing slightly as the mattress sought equilibrium. Her arms darted out to shove him off her, and he laughed as he was pushed to the side, rolling off her and finishing on his side with his head propped in his hand and his gaze delightedly fixed on her unimpressed scowl. "What are you doing up, anyway?" she moaned, "You're never up before 11."

He prodded her as if to emphasise his point. "Couldn't sleep in on my favourite ex-girlfriend's birthday, could I?"

"Bryce, I'm probably your _only_ ex girlfriend."

"Only one worth mentioning," he replied smoothly. "Happy Birthday!" he cried enthusiastically, giving her a hearty hug through the bedclothes. She responded by pushing him off again and burying her head under the pillow, groaning.

"Ahh, is my girl having age issues?"

A hand shot out from where it was clutching the pillow tightly over Lara's head and punched his arm.

"Good morning, Lady Croft!" Hillary enthused as he swept in carrying a tray of exotic breakfast. "Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday dear Lara, Happy Birthday to you!"

"She's upset," Bryce supplied as Hillary set the tray down but Lara stayed firmly hidden.

"Another year?" Hillary asked.

"That would be the reason," Bryce answered. "Well," he said, turning over to engulf Lara in another hug, "we'll leave you to come to terms with your impending middle age. Happy Birthday." He slapped a thin ring binder down on the bedside table, landed a quick kiss on Lara's shoulder, the only easily accessible anatomy at the time, and rolled off the bed.

"Happy Birthday, Lara," Hillary added, and then politely left the room, closing the door behind him.

A drawn out sigh escaped from underneath the pillow, a combination of an unwanted birthday, a rude awakening, and the after effects of the nightmare that still nagged at the edge of her mind. Throwing the pillow aside, she sat up, drawing her legs to her chest protectively and leaning her elbows on her knees as she dragged her hands over her face. It had shaken her, that was for sure – there was nothing like a bad dream to set you on edge. Well, she just hoped that, wherever he was, Kurtis was doing alright.

* * *

"Argh!" 

Kurtis' strangled cry was barely audible above the rain of bullets slamming into the wall behind him as he only just managed to dive for cover behind a large stack of wooden crates.

Crouching, he dropped the empty clip from his pistol, threw it out of the way, and slammed a new one into the chamber. He bobbed up to take aim over the crates between two higher stacks, but hadn't even taken off a single shot before the one directly to the right of his head exploded into splinters with a crash.

"Fuck!" he screamed, throwing himself back down to the ground.

His glance darted left and right, and, noticing that the stack behind him wasn't flush against the wall and provided some cover, he took a breath and then, bent over against the onslaught against him, sprinted behind them, throwing himself into a corner.

"Dammit!" he muttered. Sliding down so that he was almost flat on the floor, he fumbled around in his pocket until he got hold of his cell phone, fished it out, and began to tap out a text message.

Taking pot shots between words, he divided his attention between the phone and the fight, coolly ducking even further when one bullet whistled dangerously close past his ear and not even pausing in his frantic keying in.

Hitting send, the phone beeped to confirm that the message was on its way, and Kurtis shoved it back into his pocket, took two more shots, and then turned and ran for a new position.

* * *

Lara's mobile phone beeped, and, surprised, she raised her head from where it had been buried in her lap. She never got text messages. Well, only from Bryce and Hillary anyway, and they were downstairs. 

Curious, she threw back the covers and padded across the room to her dresser, where the phone lay.

'One Message Received', it said, so she hit the button to read it, and narrowed her eyes in bemusement at the bizarre contents before laughing out loud.

_'Sorry I haven't called, but I'm crouched behind packing crates getting shot at, so I'm a little busy. Have a great birthday, I'll speak to you later if I make it out alive.'_

She didn't even need to check the envelope to see who that was from. Giggling to herself, she dropped the phone back to its original resting place and went to the breakfast tray for some toast. If nothing else, Kurtis' predicament had at least served to alleviate her birthday blues somewhat. He was out there, he was ok – well, as ok as anyone in their profession could be, anyway – and he had remembered her birthday. Munching a mouthful of breakfast, she sat down on the edge of the bed to open her cards from Hillary and Bryce, smiling at their messages promising her birthday gifts downstairs, and then grabbed the ring binder that Bryce had dropped off.

A post it note pasted onto the cover cheered her up even more as she read Bryce's scribble: _'Best get the adventuring in before you're too old – not much time left now!'_. The message was explained when she opened up the folder to find a collation of internet articles, book photocopies, and, covering it all, a scientific paper - research for a new adventure.A smile appeared on Lara's lips as she scanned the contents and accompanying papers – she'd been starting to get restless these last few weeks.

* * *

"Any last requests before the beginning of the end?" the man asked, circling Kurtis where he hung by his wrists, dangling from the hook of a cargo crane in the corner of the warehouse. 

"Er…a final phone call? It's my friend's birthday and I'd really like to say hi, wish her a good day, and ask her to come rescue me."

"No," was the firm yet slightly amused answer.

"In that case, how about a cigarette?"

"For your own good, no again. Those things'll kill you, y'know."

"I'm sorry," said Kurtis sarcastically, "I was under the impression that the point of a last request was to grant the prisoner _their last request_. Besides, you're gonna kill me anyway, what harm can a cigarette do!"

"We're not going to kill you _just yet_," the man clarified, and then came to stand in front of Kurtis, smiling amiably. He was tall, late twenties, with shoulder length blonde hair and blue jeans teamed with a brown leather bomber jacket. "No, we have plans for you first. Big plans. Really _great _plans."

"Great plans that result in my death? Yeah, sounds fantastic."

The man smiled, apparently rather impressed by Kurtis' ability to remain casual under pressure. "Mr Trent," he pointed with both index fingers towards his trussed prisoner, "you are destined to play a part in an event of historical proportions." He began walking backwards towards the entrance as the rest of his gang stayed circled around their prisoner. "I will see you at our base of operations. When you're conscious again." He laughed and then turned, striding back outside into the winter Chicago night illuminated by the warehouse yard floodlights.

Another man stepped forward, large and muscled, and definitely lacking in his leader's sense of humour. His hand curled into a fist, and Kurtis scrunched his eyes shut and turned his face away in preparation as the fist was raised – and then there was a split second of blinding pain before everything went black.

* * *

The television was on in the main lounge as Lara came downstairs, up out of bed and unsure how to spend her day. Trailing her fingers along the wood panelled wall as she read from the folder balanced in her other hand, she smiled contentedly to herself. Her birthday cards were tucked into the pages of the file, and she stopped to display them on the hallway sideboard. 

The sounds of Takeshi's Castle floated out into the hallway from the lounge, and, following the sound towards civilisation, she made for the living room. She was vaguely aware of Bryce and Hillary watching the game show as she entered, still engrossed in the papers Bryce had given her.

"I can't believe it!" came the Scouse accent of Craig Charles from the television, "We have a winner!" Cheers arose from the sofa and, mildly surprised that someone had managed to win for once, she glanced over to the TV screen as it came within view, and then stopped dead and did a double take, folder forgotten, at what she thought she had seen, but the credits had already begun to roll. Eyes narrowed, she fixed a gaze upon her butler, but he and Bryce were only staring innocently at the television. No, surely not… Lara shook her head at the silly idea and began reading again, blindly lowering herself into a chair.

"Well, that was a quick mid life crisis," Bryce said by way of greeting.

"This…is…phenomenal," Lara stammered, indicating the folder.

"I know," Bryce replied smugly. "But not quite as good as your birthday present. Come on," and with that he snatched the folder from her hands, handed it to Hillary, and pulled her out of the chair, running off with Lara in tow.

She was led to the control room of the training arena and shoved into a desk chair. Bryce stepped back and then looked to Hillary, prompting him to give Lara her gift.

Hillary smiled and then presented her with a small box. Opening it, she came face to face with the most elaborate, gadget ridden piece of equipment masquerading as a wristwatch that she had ever seen.

"It's the same model used by the United States Air Force," Hillary explained as she examined it curiously, "it has Global Positioning, four different time zones, thermometer, barometer, tidal calendar, compass…it'll probably even make you coffee if you ask it."

Lara smiled widely, trying the watch for size. "Thankyou," she beamed, "should come in very handy."

"The presents are from both of us," Bryce interrupted impatiently. "I helped Hillary choose the watch and Hillary helped me to build this." He scampered over to the corner of the room and Lara noticed for the first time a large object draped in a dust-sheet. Bryce grabbed one corner and stood proudly before announcing with pomp and circumstance, "Lady Lara Croft, I present to you, in celebration of your illustrious birthday, The Shoot Out 2000!" He whipped the sheet off, revealing a shining curiosity of steel framework, about ten feet cubed with a small floor panel in the centre and what Lara recognised as light sensors fixed on at regular intervals all over the inside.

"The Shoot Out 2000?" she repeated curiously, walking over to get a better look.

"Well, the name could probably do with a bit of work."

The distant sound of the doorbell chose that moment to announce the arrival of the postman, and so Hillary gestured for Bryce to give her a demonstration whilst he went to collect the mail.

"It's a combat training simulator," Bryce explained, and he handed Lara a plastic laser gun and a wristband with a small sensor on it, the gun adorned with a large purple birthday gift bow. "It's like virtual reality but more advanced. You put the wristband on so the computer can aim at you, step inside, power the thing up, and then shoot or fist fight to your heart's content."

Slightly bemused by the contraption, Lara put on the wristband and then stepped onto the floor panel, looking around her at the machinery. "It uses cameras to fix your position and translate it into information that it can react to when you're fighting, a bit like those Eye Toys, and acts as an advanced Quasar when you're shooting," Bryce continued.

"Good luck," he said then and, without warning, started up the simulation. A holographic thug appeared before Lara and, before she could react to the unexpected realism, it aimed and fired. A sharp but harmless electric shock ran up Lara's arm from the wristband and she jumped.

"Ow!" she squeaked.

"Try not to let them shoot you first," Bryce offered.

Giving him a 'You could have told me that earlier' glare, Lara readied herself for the next attack and, when it came, took out the sniper with graceful ease.

"Ah, I can see that Level 1's too easy for you," Bryce said gleefully, and then suddenly Lara was surrounded by four enemies at once.

When Hillary returned a minute later with the mail, he found Bryce bent over a chair, laughing too hard to stand up straight, and Lara sprawled on the floor of her new toy clutching her wrist in gales of laughter.

"That hurts!" she managed to complain half-heartedly.

"Well, look at it this way," Bryce replied in between bouts of suffocating mirth, "it'll teach you not to get shot!"

A polite cough interrupted them and they managed to compose themselves enough to address the butler.

"Your birthday post, Madam," he said formally, bowing deeply as he held out a handful of brightly coloured envelopes, some marked with airmail stickers, and a padded envelope.

"Ooh," Lara said, taking the delivery and sitting down to open them. Cards from her friends and contacts throughout the globe, some containing small, sentimental gifts such as local souvenirs, and the padded envelope addressed in the unmistakable, illegible scrawl of one Kurtis Trent. She saved it until last, and the smile steadily growing throughout the other well wishes grew even larger as she tore the parcel open to find a simple golden necklace with an Eye Of Horus pendant, the box marked only with a slip of paper baring the simple, unsigned message of, 'To keep you safe."

She held it up, watching it catch the morning light as it spun gently.

"Nice," Bryce said coldly. Lara ignored him. Now that she and Kurtis were friends again, Bryce was forced to keep his hatred hidden, but he did so only lightly and his attitude grated on her.

"Maybe the Lady would like to enjoy some coffee whilst she plans her next adventure?" Hillary said, neatly diffusing the situation before it began as he held out the research folder to Lara. She smiled her thanks, wrapping the necklace around her hand and gathering up her cards as she took the folder and followed Hillary towards the kitchen. Bryce, scowling, stayed behind.

"So how is Mr Trent these days?" Hillary asked conversationally on their way.

"I hadn't heard from him in months, but he sent me a text message this morning saying 'Happy Birthday' and that he was getting shot at."

"So he's alright then?" Hillary asked, smirking.

"Oh, I'm sure he's fine."

* * *

Kurtis groaned as he came to. "Morning, guys." 

The 'guys' did not answer. There were two of them, standing stoically before him with their hands clasped in front, looking like your average everyday clichéd mobsters. At least, that was Kurtis' impression, but he was smart enough to keep his mouth shut. Instead he blinked to clear his blurry vision and, satisfied that he didn't have a concussion, took stock of his surroundings. He was in a storage room of some sort, sat on a chair with his ankles tied together and his hands tied behind the back-rest. A small window high and to his right let the orange glow of a streetlight in, but the room was primarily illuminated by a single naked bulb hanging from the centre of the ceiling above his head. There were crates and boxes along the walls, a few shelves and the smell of alcohol. Searching for more clues as to where he was, he squinted to make out the lettering on the boxes in the dim light, and found them to be mostly full of the stock of a bar or restaurant – alcohol, glasses, napkins, snack foods. So, he was in some sort of establishment that was apparently still in business. Well, that could prove to be helpful, at least.

"Hey, guys," he said, turning back to his minders. "Can I get a cigarette?" One of the men sneered at him, but neither answered. Kurtis sighed.

A few moments later the door opened and the humorous one from the warehouse swept in.

"Ah, Mr Trent," he said enthusiastically, "you're back with us! Marvellous. Well, no time like the present – what can you tell me about the Ritual of Anubis?"


	2. Searching For The Hidden

**Yay, here's chapter 2! I've been ultra eager to get this posted because I love the end scene so much. **

**Odd Little Turtle - Oooh, first review! Yep, cliffhangers make the world go round! Sorry if I confused you - hopefully things are a little clearer now. If I'm being too confusing at any time just yell at me and I'll explain it - sometimes I forget that you can't see what's going on in my head.**

**Linzi - Hello again! So good to have you back, and thankyou! I'm glad you like the title - I'm v. proud of it.**

**Morph - Ooooh new reviewer. Thanks:-)**

**NFI - Yep, the Ritual of Anubis. I'm as bad at names as Bryce is! LOL. And, you're the reviewer, you're meant to interfere!Thanks for putting me on your faves.**

**Lady Lara Croft - Ahh, another regular returns. :-) Thankyou for your kind words. I liked the text messaging part too - very funny in my head.**

**SilverDragon - Hi! Yep, I really enjoyed writing Bryce and Hillary's trip too. Hee Hee. Whether they'll be any more mischief from those two in this story remains to be seen. **

**Since a few of you have expressed likeyness for the title (yes - I said 'likeyness'!), I'll tell you that it was chosen to represent more than one facet of this story (boy, do I feel clever and smug LOL) and anybody familiar with British geography has probably figured out one of them already. The other will be pretty obvious after this chapter.**

_Searching For The Hidden_

"The Ritual of Anubis," Kurtis repeated, thoughtfully. He pretended to think hard and then said brightly, "No, sorry, can't say that rings any bells."

"Nothing? You have no idea what I'm talking about?" the humorous man asked, incredulously.

"None whatsoever," Kurtis smiled, doing his best to be infuriatingly cheerful.

His interrogator sighed and then dragged a chair quickly over from a corner of the room, sitting down in front of Kurtis and leaning back comfortably. "I feel we may have started on the wrong foot," he said, and Kurtis pegged him as a private school rich kid. He had that slightly superior, well-spoken air about him that spoke of a privileged upbringing and a belief in the wealth class system. Kurtis hadn't been born into poverty by any means, but he hadn't been taught to look down on people either. As if he needed any more persuading, Kurtis decided he didn't like the man.

"My name is Vincent Harding, and I'm here to make sure that we both get as much out of our time together as we can."

"Really. That's fascinating."

"Now, now, Mr Trent – "

"Oh, call me Kurtis, please," Kurtis interrupted, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Alright. Kurtis," Harding reiterated, his voice more forceful, "Let's start again, shall we? The Ritual of Anubis."

"Don't know what you're talking about. Sorry."

"Oh, I think you do."

"No, I don't," Kurtis said, sounding irritated. He glared at Harding, fed up of the whole situation already.

"The Ritual of Anubis." Vincent stood, his voice getting uncontrollably louder as Kurtis began to irk him. He clearly had a short temper. "A Lux Veritatis ritual."

"Lux Veritatis?" Kurtis asked, playing dumb.

Vincent sighed, aggravated, and nodded shortly at one of the guards. In response the guard stepped forward and slapped Kurtis sharply across his cheek. His head snapped to the side in reaction, and he slowly returned it to its original position, his tongue snaking out to taste for the blood that he suspected was seeping from his lip.

Vincent leant down menacingly, hands on the arms of Kurtis' chair.

"The Ritual of Anubis, Kurtis. Tell me what you know."

* * *

"Bryce has definitely improved on his research," Lara said to Hillary as he brewed coffee and she sat reading the file at the kitchen table. "Time was I could barely get a summary of archaeological publications, now he practically gives me directions through the tombs."

"What _is_ the latest adventure, anyway? Bryce was telling me but I must admit, I was only half listening. You know how it is – Bryce starts talking, I suddenly have some washing up to do…"

Lara quirked a smile, still reading. "Bryce has found the Helmet of Hades."

"I'm sorry?" Hillary asked, interest piqued.

"According to this paper, a theologist specialising in Ancient Greece believes he has evidence that the mythological River Styx was actually a real river, with the legends built around it originally starting as fables before being exaggerated."

"And this means…?"

"That if you've found the River Styx, you've found the entrance to Hades, and if you've found Hades – "

Bryce interrupted her, finishing the sentence from where he had appeared in the doorway. "You've found the mythological helmet of invisibility." He smiled proudly, bouncing on his toes. "To the library?" he asked nonchalantly, grinning to Lara.

* * *

"I don't know any Ritual of Anubis," Kurtis sighed, conceding knowledge of his Order and deciding that he had found Vincent's limit and would stay within it from now on.

Harding sat down again, fixing his prisoner with a hard gaze. "You're lying," he said simply.

"No, really," Trent said, sounding honest, "I don't. Look, I wasn't the best of pupils when I was in the Order, ok? I left before I could graduate, I could never manage anything they tried to teach me, I didn't want to try – I was probably skipping class when they covered that particular ceremony."

"Oh, they taught you," Harding said, conviction in his voice. "And if they didn't, you're going to wish they had, because we're not going to stop until you tell me what I need to know."

"I can't tell you something I don't know!"

"Well," Harding said, his voice returning to that same threatening tone of the moment before, "let's make absolutely certain that you don't know before we give up, hmm?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Kurtis repeated, shaking his head. "I'm telling you, I don't know."

"Maybe," Harding said, movinghis chair away and stepping back to leave plenty of room around Kurtis, "or maybe you're just lying."

* * *

"This," said Bryce, referring to the folder he snatched out of Lara's hands and then threw onto a nearby reading chair in the library, "this is just a summary. An abstract, if you will, serving only to whet your adventurous appetite. The real research is all up here." He tapped his head and then turned to a projector hooked up to a dormant laptop, waking up the machine and powering up the projector before centring the display onto a large portable whiteboard kept in the library for research purposes.

Hillary surreptitiously opened the folder and peeked inside at the dozens of papers. "That's just a summary?" he mouthed to Lara. She laughed quietly in return, turning back to Bryce as he moved to stand next to the board, projector remote control in hand ready to start his presentation.

"The River Styx," he said, showing the first slide with a number of bullet points that he proceeded to expand on. "The legendary river of the Ancient Greek myths that lay on the border between Earth and the Underworld. It was the main river of the Underworld and the most important – even the Gods were forced to keep oaths sworn by it or otherwise drink from its waters and lose their voices for nine years. Some sources say it bubbled with fire, others say that to touch its waters swept away your mortality. It's pretty much agreed that there were four other rivers of the Underworld, rivers of woe, lamentation, forgetfulness and fire. The Styx was the river of hate.

"The Underworld is often known as Hades, but that was actually the name of the god that ruled the place. Hades himself was a pitiless but fair god that everyone feared. Not a nice guy. He did, however, have something very nice – the Helmet of Hades. This was made for him by the Cyclops and made whoever wore it completely invisible. It was borrowed or stolen numerous times, usually by heroes off to slay monsters, but it could always be found back with Hades.

"You find the River Styx, you find Hades, you find Hades, you find the helmet."

"That's wonderful," said Lara, standing and listening to Bryce's lecture, "but that's no more than what you put in the folder. I'm assuming that you _do_ have more than that?"

"Just making sure our dear readers are up to speed," Bryce quipped, and then flicked on to the next slide and continued.

"Now, when this scientist's theory popped up, it got laughed at by the rest of the academic world and with good reason. He's wrong. He states that - "

"How so?" Lara interrupted, not wanting Bryce to get too deep into lecturer mode.

"Alright," Bryce sighed, dropping the remote and moving to the desk where a book was lying ready, a modern atlas opened to Europe. He tapped his finger upon Ukraine.

"Ukraine," he announced. "As you can see, two main rivers, flowing into the Black Sea – the Dnipro and the Dnister. This guy reckons it's the Dnipro. But, do some deeper digging using sources that are more mythic and less credible – and let's face it, mythic was never a problem for us before – and you come up with a number of pointers that are – well, I'll just skip to the end shall I?

He pulled a large, ancient, leather bound book from the side of the desk and opened it to a page showing Eastern Europe, though marked with the names and terminology of the 17th century, and jabbed his finger down upon the Dnister where it flowed out into the Black Sea, adjacent to a carefully drawn three headed dog-like sea monster. "Here," he said proudly, "be monsters."

* * *

The chair clattered as it and Kurtis tipped over from the force of the punch, both connecting bluntly with the concrete floor. Kurtis cried out as his weight drove the side of the chair-back hard against his arm where it was still wrapped and tied around the back, digging deeply and taking the pain right down to the bone.

He lay there for a moment, breathing heavily and blinking through the small trail of blood just reaching the corner of his eye as gravity pulled it down from where it began on his temple, a souvenir of an earlier blow.

"Up we get," Harding exerted as he took a firm hold of the chair leg and back and righted his prisoner. "That little fall knock any memories to the front of your mind?"

Kurtis only glared and swallowed, looking determined but disadvantaged through his mussed hair, cut face and slight sweat.

Harding, worryingly ready to accept the defiance, nodded towards Trent's tormentor and in response another blow just like before was delivered to the other side of Kurtis' face, sending him crashing to the ground in the other direction and crying out once again as his other arm was abused in the same way.

This time he was left on the ground, panting like before until a sharp kick from Harding's stylish and expensive pointed boot was landed against his ribs, winding him and leaving him coughing, trying to curl up protectively against the bonds securing him tightly in the sitting position.

Vincent bent down, grabbing a handful of his victim's hair and pulling his head round so that they could make challenging, defiant eye contact. "I'd heard the Lux Veritatis were a tough breed," he said with a touch of contempt, "but I didn't realise they were so stupid that they'd resist coercion without even knowing what it is they're resisting against."

"Well if you're so sure that I'd be impressed with your motives," Kurtis spat back, "why don't you tell me what they are instead of beating first and pitching later? Not very good at this whole persuasion gig, are you?"

He was sure that that barb was going to earn him another kick, but none came. Vincent only laughed. "You impress me, Mr Trent, you really do. But, I was referring more to the fact that you hadn't asked, rather than what might happen if you did know. It's like you've been so brainwashed by your Order that you'll blindly protect it without even thinking whether that's the right move. Anyway, no matter, the top and bottom of it is, you wouldn't like it if you did know, so you're probably right to resist, and inconvenient though it is for us all, this 'persuasion' as you put it, is necessary." He let Kurtis' head drop and stood back up. "Sorry," he shrugged insincerely, and then turned and walked out.

* * *

"That's Cerberus," Lara smiled, pointing to the sea monster inhabiting the Black Sea. "The three headed dog that guards the gates of Hades."

Bryce nodded, smiling. "The Dnister is the Styx."

"I'm assuming," said Hillary, speaking for the first time, "that the gateway isn't that easy to find? What with it remaining undetected all these years?"

Bryce grinned, clearly ready for that one. "The Dnister is a river. The Styx is a metaphysical concept. To turn one into the other, you need a little bit of mojo..." He began to move back to the whiteboard, to launch into another lecture, but Lara turned to leave. Her movements stopped him in his tracks and stared after her as she swept out.

"Print it! I'll read it on the plane!" she called over her shoulder to him, "Right now, we have to pack."

Hillary and Bryce shared a knowing smile at Lara's enthusiasm.

"One printout on the Ritual of Anubis coming up!" Bryce yelled back, hitting 'print' on the computer.

* * *

Kurtis' chair was righted once again and he waited for the next rain of blows, but instead he was surprised to find himself being untied and pulled to his feet. He wasn't so badly beaten that he couldn't walk, so, only wincing and breathing heavier than normal, he moved under his own power as he was led, one thug on each arm, out of the room and down a corridor.

Worn out though he was he knew that recon was vital, and so he was careful to take in his surroundings on the journey. The corridor was bare, with only a noticeboard covered in papers that he didn't get time to examine, but his location quickly became clear when the door ahead was opened and he was led out into the business side of a bar, an empty and dormant dance floor surrounded by booths and tables in front of him.

'Well, I'll be,' he thought to himself, surprised, 'I'm in a nightclub.' Judging by the hour it must have been, the club had already completed its business for the night. He was led across the dance floor, his eyes allowed to roam freely taking in his surroundings and filing it away in case escape became possible. Another unmarked door lay ahead of them and through it they went, taking him down into the basement, dark, cold and dirty. Shadows of stored objects loomed out at him in the blue darkness but he wasn't yet able to see any detail.

A small alcove to the side had been caged off with rusty bars for the secure storage of expensive spirits, but it was empty and had now become a prison cell as its door was opened and Kurtis was thrown inside. He staggered, nearly falling, and the door clanged shut behind him.

He turned and silenty watched as they locked him in and walked away, back up the steps and out into the lit ground floor.

He shivered.

Slowly his eyes became more accustomed to the gloom and the darkness became almost a comfortable one. It was the darkness of a quiet night sitting alone pondering, or lying in bed comfortably resting but not tired enough to sleep, just tucked up under the covers enjoying the solitude and the escape from the hassle of everyday life. He considered it strange that he should feel so at ease down here. Maybe the darkness blinded him as much to his predicament as it did to his surroundings.

"Who are you?"

He started, eyes darting in the direction of the question. The voice was instantly recognisable and for a moment he was filled with horror as he considered that they might have her too.

"Lara?" he asked, searching the darkness for her.

She stepped forwards, emerging from the shadows in the far corner of the room and standing in the meagre light some distance from his cell, her hands clasped loosely at her front and her features indiscernible. "What do you want?" she said.

"Lara!" Kurtis whispered, stepping forwards and grasping onto the bars, straining to see her properly. "Are you ok? Did they get you too? Get me out of here!"

She didn't speak, nor did she move. Though he couldn't see her, he got the impression that she was staring at him curiously.

"Lara! It's me, Kurtis!"

The sound of a car engine drawing up outside attracted his attention and he looked up to find a small window on the far side of the room towards the ceiling, looking out onto street level. Headlights, dispersed by raindrops and fog on the glass, filtered through as the car drew up at the window and blinded him momentarily, but then the engine died and the lights went out, and when he looked back to Lara, she had gone.


	3. Alone With Memories

**Chapter 3. Here we are. I appear to have confused a few people, so let me clarify. Ironically enough, the story starts near the end. That's that first paragraph. Then it skips back to the beginning, three weeksearlier, straight into Lara's nightmare, which is the italics. After that, yep, some of you were right,it's all the same timeline and no, Lara isn'treally there with Kurtis. She's in England embarking on her latest adventure whilst he's locked up in a Chicago nightclub.Lara's nightmare, though strangely similar to Kurtis' experiences, happens before he's even kidnapped. Unreal, eh? LOL**

**SilverDragon - Thanks! Yep, I'd say pity is the right word. Poor Kurtie. :-( I would help him, but, hey, y'know... LOL**

**Linzi - Thankyou! Glad you like Bryce's 'readers up to speed' quip - you gotta have injokes, right?**

**Lady Lara Croft - Oooh you flatter me:-) And yep, got it in one, Lara's all in poor Kurtis' abused head.**

**Godavari - Hey, girl, calm down! No worries! I'm just glad you're reading. And y'know, if you complain about cliff hangers, I'm only going to be evil and put more in. Hee Hee**

**Jordana - Oooh, hello, new reviewer! Welcome! I'm happy that you like this and I'm ecstatic that I'm getting recommended! Good to know my research does not go unnoticed, although due to the completely unfactual basis of the Styx being real there will be a fair amount of, shall we say, artistic license! LOL. I'm going to try to keep it as fact based as possible though. **

_Alone With Memories_

"Are you sure you're not being a little hasty?" Hillary asked Lara, knowing it was useless. They were in her bedroom, Hillary removing items from Lara's suitcase as fast as she was throwing them in. For such a seasoned traveller the girl had no idea how to pack. She just took what she wanted and hurled it towards the case, stuffing it in and slamming the lid down, which meant that it was always left to Hillary to intercept her luggage and fold her clothes properly. Doing the laundry when she returned from a trip that he hadn't accompanied her on was a nightmare; the ironing took hours.

"No," Lara said shortly in answer to Hillary's question.

"Well, what if it's a wasted journey because Bryce has made a mistake? Or what if he's not researched the dangers properly and you meet something you're not prepared for?"

"Then I'll become prepared – very quickly," Lara sighed, used to Hillary's usual pre-adventure fussing. She dug around in her wardrobe, pulled out the bomber jacket that she'd rescued from the ill fated plane on her Dagger of Xian chase, surveyed it for a second and then tossed it over her shoulder, where it landed half in the suitcase.

"I just think it might be pertinent to spend a couple of days doing some detailed research with Bryce into the finer points, that's all."

Lara dumped her boots onto the bed and gave Hillary a momentary mild glare. "That article about the Styx being based on a real river has already been out two weeks – if other raiders have made the same connections we have and come up with the same conclusions, a couple of days might cost me the Helmet."

"Well, do we really _need_ a helmet of invisibility anyway?" Hillary pleaded, exasperated by her willingness to rush into things without thinking and the dusty boot prints now left on her duvet. "We _are_ running out of room."

"That's why I sold things," Lara stated, pondering whether to take her black catsuit or not. "To make room."

"Yes, and then you got more things for Christmas when Kurtis sent you that replica of the Periapt Tip and you had less room to put them all in when you extended the garage to make way for that new model Bentley you just _had_ to have, and, I might mention, have hardly driven."

"So, I'll sell more," Lara said absently, decanting shampoo into a travel bottle. "I meant to send the Dagger of Xian to the auction house last time, anyway."

Hillary dropped the socks he was balling and glared at Lara's back at that news, and then picked up a boot and held it aloft as if to hurl it at her, but quickly let it drop when Bryce appeared in the doorway.

"Lara, the flight's booked," Bryce said, leaning into the room. "Three first class seats to the Ukraine; check-in's at eight."

"Good," said Lara, picking up her make-up bag and dropping it into the suitcase before pointedly snatching her top out of Hillary's hand. "Time enough for you to pack and for us all to have dinner before we go, then."

Hillary sighed, relinquishing the packing and leaving the room behind Bryce.

"She wants to sell the Dagger of Xian," Hillary said with annoyance as they moved down the hallway to their own rooms.

"Oh, you're frickin' kidding me!" Bryce said, opening the door to his room and sweeping inside.

"Nope!" Hillary replied, shouting to make himself heard before slamming his own door.

* * *

Kurtis was woken by a strong light being shone onto his face as he slept, lying awkwardly on the hard uncovered floor. Rolling his head and muttering curses as he brought his hands up to his eyes, he tried to avoid the blinding beam as he was quickly pulled back to full consciousness.

"Jesus!" he complained, squinting and pushing his the upper body up off the floor with his arms, "I'm awake, ok! Turn it off!"

The light was moved out of his face and he blinked, seeing only the mirage of his own retinas for a moment before his eyes recovered and he managed to focus on his keepers.

There were two of them, stood over him in the doorway of his makeshift cell with impassive faces and a gun aimed at his chest along with the flashlight beam.

Kurtis coughed chestily as he got to his feet, the cold and damp having begun to get to him already.

"Back up against the far wall, please," one of them said, indicating the position with the flashlight. Kurtis did as he was told, backing up warily, the gun following him.

The one with the flashlight ducked out of the cell and reached around the corner, pulling a kitchen trolley into view. It was wheeled over to the entrance and then shoved into the cell.

"We'll be back in twenty minutes, eat up," the man said, and then they left, locking his cell door securely and hurrying out of the cellar.

Kurtis watched them go with an air of suspicion but as soon as the door at the top of the stairs had closed and the lock had clicked, he darted over to the delivery. It was a sealed plastic container, the kind that take-out is ladled into, and a small bottle of mineral water.

He opened them, sniffing suspiciously. Thankfully, his captors didn't appear to have a twisted sense of humour, because the food was hot and fresh and the water tasted clean and cold. They'd even had hospitality enough to leave him a plastic fork, though it had been dumped on the dirty trolley. He wiped it off with his fingers and then moved everything to the floor and tucked in, sitting cross legged and eating ravenously.

It was too dull to properly see, but the food was identified by taste as chicken chop suey. Chewing quickly on a mouthful, he pulled up his sleeve and illuminated his watch face. Seven thirty a.m. Dawn must have just been beginning, because it wasn't as black as it had been the previous night. It'd be fully light soon and then he'd be able to assess his surroundings more easily, maybe figure a way out of there, since no-one was going to let him out.

That reminded him – Lara. It could have just been the tiredness and the beating last night, but he was so sure that he'd seen her. Was she here? A thought occurred to him and, taking another mouthful of food, he shifted to kneel at the bars and look out at his limited view of the room. Why would they need a food trolley just to deliver him his meagre breakfast?

He grabbed the bottle and screwed the top back on before tipping it on its side and trying it for size against the gaps between the bars. It wouldn't fit, which explained why they needed to come into his cell and the trolley allowed them to do that faster than having to come in and put it down on the floor, but even so, there were two of them…on the one hand, they needed the gun trained whilst the light was kept going otherwise they risked having their prisoner jump them in the twilight, but one could hold a gun and a light at the same time whilst the other put the food on the floor, right?

Maybe, they needed the trolley because his breakfast wasn't the only one they were carrying and they _did_ have Lara. He didn't get a good look at the cellar last night, it was entirely possible that there was another lock up in there with Lara in it that he'd missed. Or, he thought to himself despondently as he flopped back down to continue eating, they just thought pushing the trolley inside was the safer option for them.

"You're not here, are you Lara?" he said to the quiet, fully expecting no answer, and indeed none came. "No," he said to himself as he bit some chicken off his fork, "didn't think so."

* * *

The vivid colours of the photograph spoke of a time of happiness, but those that had been present couldn't help but look at it and remember a thin veil of sadness over it all.

Taken after Lara and Kurtis' dealings with The Company, before he had left for an emotional pilgrimage, it depicted the two in warm sunshine, Kurtis behind and slightly to the right of his friend, his arms hugging around her waist, both of them beaming at the camera. The rich green leaves of the weeping willow behind them created a serene backdrop to contrast with their modern outfits, Lara in black jeans and a red top, Kurtis in desert camouflage trousers and a black T-shirt.

Lara picked it up in its ornate silver frame and traced her fingers over the image, remembering. Hillary had taken it. Bryce had been nowhere to be seen all that week, still angry that Kurtis had rejoined the fold. She had wanted them all in the photograph, but Bryce wouldn't come out of his room and so rather than have an incomplete family picture, they had opted for a complete partnership picture.

"You miss him, don't you?"

Bryce's voice rang out in the silence from behind her. She took one last look at the picture and then replaced it on the sideboard, surrounded by snapshots of herself, Hillary and Bryce taken over the years.

"It's just going to be a little strange going back out there without him," Lara said, covering her wistfulness.

Bryce studied her for a moment and then gave an amazing show of selflessness and said, "Ask him to come."

Lara smiled, both imagining the high jinx that they could get up to searching for the underworld and also appreciating Bryce's checked attitude. "No," she said, turning away from the photos, "I'd rather it was just the three of us for this one." She touched Bryce's shoulder and gave him a smile as she passed, leaving the room.

* * *

Kurtis was sitting, leaning against the bars and playing with the plastic fork when the door to the cellar opened and his guards returned. He twisted around, watching them approach with curiosity. He hadn't quite reached dread, yet. He was doing ok, he was staying calm, he was going to handle this.

"Up against the wall again," one said. Kurtis did as he was asked and backed up out of the way, watching his captors as they opened the door and reached in to pull out the trolley, one with a gun trained on him through the bars. The sun had finished rising and though the cellar wasn't even approaching a state that could be described as daylight, it was illuminated enough for him to make a cursory examination.

They were both dressed in jeans and shirts, one in trainers, and the other with a hairstyle similar to his own. They and their colleagues' lack of professional dress and unpractised approach to interrogation and imprisonment techniques told Kurtis one wonderfully prominent thing: this was an amateur operation. Internally, he smiled at his small advantage, but externally he remained passive and curious, as though he had an amiable attitude to the whole affair – at least, as long as he wasn't being tied to a chair and beaten up, anyway.

The trolley was pulled out of the cell and allowed to roll out to the middle of the room as the barred door was once again locked and the man then took out his own gun and aimed. "Put your hands through the bars," he said.

Kurtis obliged, shoving his hands through two gaps.

"No – no, so I can cuff you. Put them between the same two bars, one above the other," the other man said, his manner hinting at a growing fluster.

Rolling his eyes slightly, Kurtis adjusted his position and was duely handcuffed from the safety of the other side of the bars. The door was then opened and he stood, moving out and allowing himself to be frogmarched away, taking a quick look around the cellar as he did so – no Lara.

* * *

"Alright," Lara said that evening as the plane levelled off after take off on its way to Budapest, the stop-off for their ultimate destination of Odessa, Ukraine, "tutor me."

"Pleasure," Bryce returned, as he sat back down after having stood to retrieve his research from his hand luggage in the overhead locker. He unfolded the seat table and laid out the papers as Hillary and Lara, either side of Bryce, settled down to listen.

"These are copies of the original documents," he said, pushing several photocopies and digital photographs of foreign language scripts over to Lara to browse through should her language skills be fluent enough to translate them, "and these are the translations, which are either taken from academic websites or done painstakingly by yours truly.

"Though I can't find any real details, as far as I can tell the Dnister originally was, in every way, the Styx. Then, the Greek gods left or were ousted or whatever – I dunno – but basically as the Ancient Greek culture faded the gods put a 'lock' on the Styx, making its mystical attributes accessible only through magic in order to protect it whilst they weren't around to watch over it anymore. That's why the Styx is now the plain old Dnister. Right?"

Lara and Hillary nodded their comprehension, Lara squinting at the originals as she tried to follow Bryce's explanation in its native language. "So how do we unlock it?" Hillary asked, a hint of annoyance in his voice. Bryce grated on him _far_ too easily sometimes.

"Well," the techie continued, accompanying his explanation with gestures to various interesting but basically useless photos of Greek vase paintings and wall carvings, "originally there was an unlocking ritual documented by some of the last priests of the Ancient Greek gods."

"Originally?" Lara said, looking up and eyeing Bryce with a look that just dared him to follow that up with a 'but'.

"But," Bryce said, earning a glare, "that knowledge has been lost."

"So why are we here, Bryce?" Lara asked with false amiability as she dropped the photos she was holding back onto the table.

"Wait, wait, wait, let me finish," he protested. "I'm certain that we can achieve the same effect with an Egyptian ritual known as the Ritual of Anubis. Not a great name, I know, but I suppose it loses something in the translation…"

"What makes you think that?" Hillary interrupted.

"What I _do_ know about the original spell was that it was to contact the Underworld, thus turning the river back into the gateway. The Ritual of Anubis is exactly the same thing, a way to contact the Underworld. Different Underworlds, yeah, but aren't all religions just different aspects of the same belief?"

"According to _some_ people," Lara said, annoyed.

"No, look, look," Bryce moaned, searching out another visual aid, "it's not entirely my idea. According to this Egyptologist, the Ritual of Anubis apparently has Greek roots."

"Greek roots?" Hillary didn't understand.

"Ancient Greece is an oft-misunderstood term that actually encompasses the entire Greek known world over a long period of history. It included both what is now Southern Ukraine and parts of Egypt. Greeks settled abroad in colonies and took their culture with them," Lara explained quickly, well versed in her history as always.

"Right," Bryce agreed, pointing at her, "like she said. So it's not impossible that the Ritual of Anubis could in fact _be_ the original Greek key to the Styx, just a corrupted version adopted by the Egyptians."

Lara let out a contemplative 'hmm', taking the scientific paper written about the Ritual of Anubis from Bryce's fingers and looking it over. "It's possible, I suppose."

* * *

Kurtis grunted as he fell to the floor, dropped unceremoniously back through the door of his cell after another long and pointless interrogation. For hours, the same question and always the same truthful answer.

'What do you know about the Ritual of Anubis?' 'Nothing.'

A half hour's respite every now and then, just as it was beginning to become too much, was all he had been afforded, and now he lay panting on the grimy, cold floor, aching all over with a splitting headache and so tired that his eyes stung when they were closed.

Slowly, he calmed, allowing the silence to pervade and the pain to dissipate throughout his body, spreading the focus from the cuts and bruises so that it was somehow a more easily bared state of being rather than a distressing punctuation to an exhaustive state.

Just as he felt able to relax into a mindset near sleep, he heard her voice from behind him, within the cell.

"Who are you?"

He gasped, forgetting his pain for a moment as he flipped onto his back to look in her direction. He blinked rapidly, not quite understanding what he saw. Lara stood there, inhabiting his previously empty cell and staring down at him expectantly, waiting for an answer. She was wearing the clothes he had first seen her in when he had accosted her in the Louvre, and their dark colours seeped into the dusk surrounding her, leaving her shadowy and mystical.

"What do you want?" she asked.

"Lara!" he gasped again, forcing himself up into a half-sitting position supported by his hands, "Is it you?"

A slight smile crossed her lips at that question, and she stared down at him compassionately.

"Lara," he groaned, "the door," and he looked over to indicate the need for her help in escape, but she didn't move to offer any assistance, and when he looked back to query her inaction, she had gone.


	4. Unguarded Misery

**Thanks to a few days off work for Easter and a minor concussion from a meeting between my head and a wall, you're getting chapter 4 a little earlier than usual. I'm conscious that these first few chapters show me very much finding my way with this story. Don't worry, I have things planned and the action will be hotting up very soon. And look at the earlier chapters of No Man's Land - they were horrible! This chapter is rather Lara-light, but due to the different time zonesmy characters are in(I have got to kick that habit, it's very confusing) she's actually asleep for most of this! She'll be back with a vengeance in the next chapter though, never fear. Fishman's an original character so, no, you're not supposed to recognise him.**

**SilverDragon, Linzi and Godavari - You get an amalgamated reply this week since you all said much the same thing. Thankyou, first of all, for reviewing and enjoying. That Dagger of Xian bit - I just couldn't resist! And the Ritual and Kurtis' visions will be explained soon. Not yet, though. All will slowly become clear. :-)**

_Unguarded Misery_

"…I'll just always think of him as MacGyver, that's the – "

Lara was cut off in mid-sentence as Bryce's eyes flicked away from hers to over her shoulder and he nodded his head in gesture. She turned, blindly setting her drink back down on the hotel bar.

Approaching them, winding his way through the evening crowd, was Gareth Fishman. He reached their small party of three where they were perched circled next to the bar and stood, smiling amiably. "Can I buy you people a drink?"

"Um…I think we'd probably need more than one drink for the three of us," Bryce said, attempting to show a distinct lack of welcome.

"Hello, Gareth," said Lara.

"Hi, Lara," he returned, smiling and tapping his fingers on his other hand nervously where they were held at his front.

"Here on business?"

"Yeah. My assistant's upstairs, working."

"Still got James working for you?"

"No, no, I have Maria now. James decided tomb raiding wasn't really his business – bit of a problem with the Ark of the Covenant. Almost…got him killed," Fishman said, laughing nervously.

"So you got the Styx article as well, then?"

"Yeah, yeah. I hear there's a nice helmet of invisibility in the underworld."

"Mmmm," Lara said into her drink noncommittally.

"Would you like a drink?" Hillary asked politely, in a better position to call over the bartender from his seat right by the bar than Fishman, standing at the edge of the group.

"Uh – bourbon chaser, please."

Bryce reached behind him and pulled over another bar stool, lifting it slightly as he dragged it and then letting it drop back again in a manner that suggested the invitation wasn't actually open. Fishman sat down anyway and accepted the drink off Hillary.

"So when did you arrive?" Lara asked him.

"Yesterday," Fishman replied, nodding. "We're just…taking our time, sorting out the practicalities…I suppose we're going to have to hurry up now you're here though!" He laughed again, obviously more than uncomfortable with the aloof manner in which he was being treated.

"I suppose so." Lara held up her glass to Fishman. "May the best raider win."

"May he," Fishman agreed, chinking his glass against Lara's. He downed the chaser in one and flashed his company a self-conscious smile.

* * *

Vincent Harding stood and patiently waited as Kurtis began to wake up.

The prisoner was forcibly standing towards one corner of the nightclub storage room with his hands cuffed and the chain looped over a meat hook set into the ceiling, black with age, a relic from the nightclub's previous incarnation as a meat warehouse.

Kurtis muttered incoherently and then raised his head, eyes blinking and lungs inhaling as he suddenly reached consciousness.

Harding regarded him curiously.

"Who is Lara?"

Kurtis didn't answer, only swallowing and shifting his weight uncomfortably from foot to foot after hours of standing as he stared back at Harding, a flicker of derision in his eyes.

"You were talking in your sleep," Harding explained, trying to prompt an answer through cooperation. "You called for Lara. You asked her why she didn't…open the door?"

Kurtis paused and then decided to grant an answer. "A friend."

"I take it from your tone of voice that you're not too happy with her? For…not opening the door?"

"Smart-ass doesn't suit you, Harding," Kurtis sneered.

Harding gave a little laugh of disbelief, a show of offence. "I'm just curious!"

"Lady Lara Croft, if you must know." Kurtis was still scornful.

"You know Lady Lara Croft? _The_ Lady Lara Croft? Renowned archaeologist? Wanted for murder last year? _That_ Lady Lara Croft?"

"Yes."

"Well – I _am_ impressed." Harding began to pace slightly, digesting the surprise. Then, he stopped mid-step, something apparently occurring to him. He looked up to Kurtis, careful suspicion on his face. "Have you spoken to her lately?"

Kurtis blinked rapidly, his head dropping, his expression openly sorrowful. "I haven't seen her."

A smile quirked at the edge of Vincent's mouth and, hands behind his back, he looked away in thought. Absently he said, "Do excuse me," and then he turned and hurried out.

Kurtis stood in the empty room, silent and abandoned. "Please come back, Lara."

* * *

Kurtis had been alone for some time now. The electric light was becoming harsher as the sunlight poking through the window faded at sunset and he was desperate to sit down.

His feet and legs ached from standing. It had probably been no longer than a shop assistant or a hair stylist had to stand, he chastised himself, but he wasn't used to it and he'd been through hell and he just wanted to die and if he could only take the weight off his feet then he might feel better and it was all so hard and he didn't care whether it was manly or not but he just wanted to _cry._ He'd tried bending his knees and taking all his weight with his arms, but they were aching too and his wrists were hurting from hanging their weight off the cuffs and when he was hanging by his arms it was difficult to breathe and damn it, why couldn't it just be over? He let out a few sobs, trying to coerce himself into crying but for some reason the tears just wouldn't come even though he desperately, desperately just wanted to give in and feel thoroughly sorry for himself.

Why didn't they believe him? Why couldn't they see that he'd have broken already if it were possible. He was a tough guy, tougher than most, but torture was turning out to be a whole other deal. It wasn't just the pain, it was the misery and the loneliness and the feeling of victimisation and why wasn't Lara here to save him and god damn it, it had only been two days and why wasn't he tougher than this!

He started as a far-away beat took up, fast and deep. It was music – the nightclub had opened up for the evening. That could make his fortunes go either way – they could lock him in his cell away from the revellers, or they could take advantage of the noise to cover his screams. So far all they'd done to him were things that made him cry out or moan but with the assurance that no-one could hear anything…he swallowed, desperately trying not to think of the things they could do to him that could make him protest so much louder.

A few minutes passed and the tribal beat of the music began to calm him somewhat. He sniffed, slowly regaining control of himself and took a long, shuddering breath.

Harding returned, looking agitated. A flicker of hope flared in Kurtis as he realised that Harding was alone – so far he'd always had someone else do the beating whilst he just stood at a safe distance and did the repeated questioning. God forbid he should get those expensive clothes dirty.

Vincent strode over, a sudden anger flashing in his eyes, and he came and stood too close to Trent, face pushed in his, an errant strand of hair fallen into his eyes completely ignored.

"Enough. Can you or can you not tell me anything about the Ritual of Anubis?" he spat.

"I told you – " Kurtis began, but Harding spun away, punching a hand into his other open palm and snarling in anger.

"You know!" he shouted, turning back and throwing out an arm in an accusatory point, "You may not remember it but somewhere in that mind of yours, you know. The writings say that the Ritual of Anubis is taught when an initiate is fourteen, you said you left at eighteen, you've _done_ this!"

"I don't remember! Not a thing!" Kurtis yelled back, finding a sudden strength enough to defend himself.

"Why not!"

"Maybe I don't want to!"

A sudden silence descended on the room, both parties frozen, their angered breathing the only sign of their life, both somewhat shocked at Kurtis' words.

"What do you mean?" Harding asked, his voice quiet.

"I hated the Lux Veritatis. I hated my father. I hated what they did to me, what they put me through, I hated that I wasn't good enough. I barely remember half the lessons they taught me. My chirugai, the telekinesis – it's a part of me, it's in my body now but the stuff in my head…I didn't want it there."

"So it's repressed," Harding said, understanding. "It's in there somewhere, we just have to find it."

"Just let me go," Kurtis pleaded, tired of being pushed for information he did not have.

"I'm sorry, Trent," Harding said coldly, "but I don't have time. I'll _make_ you remember because we don't have any other choice."

* * *

Kurtis' voice croaked, his words slow and faltering. "I don't…know…what you're…talking about."

Vincent Harding stood and regarded his prisoner for a moment. Kurtis' head jerked forwards as he coughed, eyes squeezing shut slightly to demonstrate his exhaustion. An old table was his bed, Trent lying on it with his feet tied to hooks screwed into the wood and his hands cuffed either side of his head, also secured to hooks. It was amazing what thrift and a vague knowledge of DIY could achieve, he mused in a rare moment of calm amidst the race against time.

"I believe you, Mr Trent," he said then, looking down at Kurtis almost sorrowfully. "I really do. But unfortunately it just isn't good enough."

Kurtis cried out as Harding tipped the bottle of whiskey that he held aloft and the spirit splashed down on the deep cut across his chest, stinging intensely.

"I hate to do this to you, Kurtis. Gratuitous violence was never my thing. Neither was wasting good alcohol. But, I'm pretty sure that once your body has had enough your mind will give in, and then it will all be over."

"It doesn't work like that," Kurtis whispered, head lolling to one side and eyes sliding shut. "Just give up. You've obviously done your research to know this much about the Lux Veritatis, why don't you just research the ritual yourself?"

"You know as well as I do that the details – the all important details – of these kinds of things only exist in the minds of the initiated and you, my friend, are the last of your kind. Not to mention that only the mind of a Lux Veritatis is capable of successfully completing the ritual."

"My mind…" Kurtis whispered, a pained smile appearing on his lips, "…not so well trained." He snarled as more whiskey fell onto his wound.

"You know, alcohol burns really quite well. And that cut does look like it could do with cauterising."

"No. It's fine, really."

"Now, now, Doctor's orders. Well, not quite." Vincent took a swig of the whiskey as he turned away and started to rummage through the shelves holding the nightclub sundries. "I never finished med school. My parents sent me, wanted me to be an upstanding citizen worthy of my class status, something they could show off about to their lawyer friends. I wasn't so into it, myself. Had a lot of great parties, though, hung out with a lot of rich girls. Eventually I just decided that with my money I could do that without needing college assignments as an excuse so I left. Parents weren't too happy, but they're hoping I'll grow out of my rebel stage and go back to graduate." He finished his story as he found what he was looking for and returned to the table.

Opening the box, he removed a match and struck it alight. "This is gonna hurt me more than it's going to hurt you," he said falsely, and then he let it drop.

* * *

Kurtis could barely walk as they dragged him back to the cellar. He stumbled and tripped as the guards, supporting the majority of his weight, hurried him back through the club. His ordeal had finished some time before but they had left him tied in the storage room to begin his recovery whilst they waited for closing time. Now the club was empty they were returning him to his lock up where he could be safely left without supervision.

The door to his cell clanged open and they pushed him in, Kurtis falling to his knees and burying his head in his lap. The main door to the cellar was slammed shut and the key turned and immediately Lara was stood before him once again, impassive to his suffering.

"Who are you?"

"What do you mean?" he begged, pleading with his eyes and imploring with his hands. "What do you want from me?" He was dirty, unkempt, cut, bruised and desperate for respite.

"What do you want?" she asked.

"I don't know what you mean!" he cried, but she did not react to his distress, only regarding him patiently, and in desperation he broke down into tears, his body sagging where he knelt on the floor. "Please!" he sobbed, looking up and reaching out to her, "Lara, please…", but she was gone and Kurtis was alone once more.

"Please," he sobbed to the darkness, falling forwards and dropping his head to the dirt caked floor as his hands clawed at the unforgiving stone, "please…"

**Oh, poor Kurtis. :-( Don't worry, I'm going to keep the violence subtle, I dislike writing it even more than I do reading it! Anybody recognise that last scene from anywhere...?**


	5. Tombs of Forgotten Warriors

**Gosh, this chapter was a bitch to write. That'll teach me to start posting stories before I've fully worked out all my plot details, eh! Anyway, here we have, I think, a detailed, plot-hole-free, vaguely historically accurate installment.**

**Thanks to those of you who expressed concern over my concussion - I appreciate it, and I'm fully recovered now. :-) And, since almost everyone of you (rightfully!) expressed a dislike for the treatment of Kurtis, I've happily left it to the imagination this time. I've illustrated what he's going through, that was all that was important and we don't need to suffer that anymore.**

**SilverDragon - Thankyou kindly. Well done for recognising that last scene as the dream sequence Lara had. The plot thickens, no?  
NFI - Thanks for reviewing again! Look, no Kurtis mistreatment today! Yay!  
Linzi - Thankyou too. We'll be learning a lot more about Mr Fishman. Originally I was going to introduce him than almost immediately kill him off, but I think he's kind of interesting...  
Lady Lara Croft - Oooh two reviews! My gratitude to you!  
Godavari - You are too funny for words:-) I loved your review. Reign in that pokey stick because here's another installment! Although, you'll have to wait until next chapter to find out what's happening with Kurtis' freaky visions. Hee Hee.**

_Tombs of Forgotten Warriors_

Lara exited the jeep and slammed her door, looking over to Bryce and Hillary as they climbed out of the other side. "Lonely Planet were not wrong when they said that driving in Ukraine was not for the faint hearted." She took a calming breath and straightened her hair and clothes. "And I thought driving in central London was chaotic…"

They looked up, taking in the massive gothic building before them that attracted their attention with its elaborately carved entrance and pillars and drew their gaze upwards with its elongated architecture punctuated with ledges and gargoyles at each floor, shooting up towards the sky.

"If we can't find what we're looking for in there, then it doesn't exist and the Helmet of Hades will remain forever hidden," Hillary remarked.

"Let's hope you're right," Lara muttered, and together they walkedto the largest library in Odessa.

"So remind me," Hillary continued, "_what_ is it that we're looking for, exactly?"

"A keyhole."

"A keyhole?"

"Bryce's research gives me the key – the Ritual of Anubis – but not the keyhole. When and where do we need to perform the ritual?"

Bryce got slightly defensive at that. "Hey – my research didn't make any references to the needs for a when or where."

"That's why we're here," Lara smiled, pushing open the door.

The reception was attended only by a wiley old woman with long grey hair and an old fashioned, dark coloured dress that was made even darker by the sombre lighting that seemed to purposefully pervade the whole place, as if its gothic origins prevented it from entering the era of the electric light. Lara smiled slightly as they walked past reception, happy to find herself unchallenged. Obviously their only obstacle would be in checking out any books they found, but hopefully the institution had been dragged far enough into the modern world to incorporate photocopiers, and Bryce probably had his handheld scanner anyway.

After some searching and a lot of use of a Ukrainian/English dictionary, they eventually found the mythology and ancient history sections, hidden adjacent and deep in a corner of the sixth floor stacks, even more dimly lit than the rest of the place. Hillary made a face as he selected a random volume, the dust coming off thick on his fingers, and opened it up.

"My god," he said, "the last time this was checked out, I was eight."

"Doesn't surprise me," Bryce said. "It's not like we've seen more than five people the whole time we've been here."

"It's a shame," Lara said quietly. "Sad, when you think about it. All these books, all this knowledge, and it's just…forgotten. Left by the way side. People don't have time for this anymore, and when they do need it they just run a search on the internet."

"They don't know what they're missing," Bryce piped up, surprising everybody with his words. "It's nice to get back to a nice book that's older you are and hidden in some dark, peaceful corner of a library. It's like…being the first person in longer than you can reasonably imagine, to read some long forgotten knowledge…like finding treasure, y'know? A privilege." Bryce continued to leaf through a yellowed book, unaware of the amazed stares he was receiving from Lara and Hillary. Exchanging a look that could only be described as conveying, 'Well, what d'ya know?', they said nothing and turned back to their own searches, choosing the English language books first.

Half an hour later they were sitting around a well-polished table by an original window, books open and spread out across the whole area lit by the pale afternoon light, Bryce's laptop squeezed into a corner and taking notes.

"Watch your internet connection, Bryce," Lara quietly warned. "I don't trust Fishman not to have Maria spy on what we're doing."

"What makes you think they'd need to?"

"What was it he said? 'Taking his time and sorting out the practicalities'? Gareth is as clueless as we are when it comes to the details. If he wasn't, he wouldn't be risking losing the Helmet to all the other raiders out there."

Interrupting with a complete change of subject as though he had been unaware of the other conversation all along, Hillary spoke.

"And Anubis appeared from the depths of the seas, as tall as the mountains westward and as black as the waters in the storms he brought. He looked upon the bank where the warrior knelt. 'For I am your servant; your voice rouses me from my slumber. Arise, messenger of my lord. The Gates are open.' And the warrior stood, forcing Anubis to his knees, and the waters bubbled as though boiling. He was swept deep, taken down into the underworld, and the warrior was seen no more."

Lara and Bryce looked up, startled by the description.

"That's the translation of a Latin inscription found on an otherwise unmarked tomb unearthed during an excavation of Tyras, the Ancient Greek city built on the banks of the Dnister. Apparently the inscription was roughly done, as if it wasn't supposed to be there. They theorised that maybe it was the metaphorical explanation for an unknown drowning victim." Hillary elaborated.

"Mountains westward…that must mean the Carpathians, Egypt doesn't have any. And black waters…the Black Sea was thought to be named so because of the dark storms that pervade in winter," Lara murmured.

Bryce chipped in. "We already know from that old map in our library that the Black Sea is where the Underworld is, and it doesn't sound like Egpyt, not to mention that it was found in Ukraine - that has to relate to the Ritual of Anubis being used to gain entrance to Hades."

"So we perform the ritual on the banks of the Dnister at the mouth to the Black Sea?" Hillary asked.

Lara nodded. "When, though?"

Bryce took the book from Hillary and turned to his laptop to take notes, but stopped when he found the internet search he'd been running had finished and there was now a search result window taking priority on his screen. Holding the book limply in one forgotten hand, he now scanned through the page summaries, his eyes moving quickly. "I think I may have just found that one out."

He put the book down, opening up one of the internet sites and scan reading, summarising aloud to his companions as he went. "There's an Egyptian myth…about a boy and his father who are the only ones to ever go to the afterlife and return…the boy was some sort of sorcerer…he took his father to the Temple of Osiris…did a ritual…they toured the afterlife and returned. Looks like the whole thing happened over the course of one night – they had to be back before dawn, before the Boat of Ra that carries the dead was reborn into the morning."

"And the ritual?" Lara asked.

Bryce read in more detail, a smile growing steadily. "Almost exactly the same as what we've researched as the Ritual of Anubis."

Lara grinned. "Then we make for the Dnister at sunset."

Above them, a CCTV camera whirred as it zoomed in on their position, its outer casing spinning as it refocused on their activities.

* * *

In his hotel room, Gareth Fishman leaned over Maria, watching the streaming video on her laptop over her shoulder. Pixelated and black and white, two men and one woman sat around a library desk surrounded by books and discussing something one of them was reading off a computer. 

"Can you read what's on that monitor?"

Maria continued tapping her keyboard, sending code to the library's surveillance cameras. The video on her screen zoomed in on the computer, and then sharpened, giving a perfect view of the online text.

Fishman grinned. "Take a screenshot, then see what's in that book Hillary's got." He straightened up, looking conceited. "Thanks, Lara, that's just what I needed," he said to himself.

* * *

The hotel lobby was two storeys high, with doors high up in the East and West walls leading through to the second floor rooms. A large marble grandiose staircase started out in the centre of the five-star lobby and reached up, splitting in two halfway up and curving out in opposite directions to meet the doors. Its balustrade was carved stone, its cool and old surface inviting one descending to stop and lean on it, looking down over the richly carpeted floor below with a dark wooden reception desk to one side and plush armchairs around low gilded coffee tables and free standing chess boards to the other. Grand though it was, it was a touch shabby, showing its age, but it only seemed to make the place more homely. 

The inviting class of the place was, however, completely ignored by the two parties who now entered from opposite sides of the second floor almost simultaneously, clumping down the steps, overloaded with equipment and encumbered by warm hiking clothes. Halfway down the first flight the two groups stopped, spying each other at the same moment and coming to a halt both in conversation and motion, eyeing each other calculatingly.

After a moment's pause, they both began to continue down to the central reservation where the two staircases joined into the one, stopping on the small landing in front of each other and continuing to silently weigh each other up.

"Hello, Gareth," said Lara somewhat warily, flanked on either side by Bryce and Hillary.

"Morning, Lara," Fishman greeted, returning the look as his technical assistant Maria, stood to his side, looked Bryce and Hillary over. She took in Hillary's uncomfortable carrying of the practical clothes and Bryce's dishevelled appearance, his role clearly stated by the laptop bag slung over his shoulder, and looked down her nose with a gaze that oozed the air of a youngster thinking they knew it all. Bryce glared as Hillary politely chose to look the other way.

"Going somewhere?" Gareth asked.

"Nowhere special," was Lara's evasive reply.

"Right," Fishman acknowledged, nodding absent-mindedly, knowing full well where Lara was going and wondering how to excuse himself whilst maintaining a headstart.

The two groups looked each other over again, lips pursing slightly in polite hesitancy as everyone wondered the same as Gareth.

Fishman's eyes trailed over to Maria, betraying his intention to the other three.

"GO!" he yelled to her, ending the wait for all involved, and Lara and company took off at a dead run down the remaining stairs at the same time as their opposing team turned to flee, all five vying for space on the marbled steps with pushes and shoves, clattering at speed through the lobby and out into the car park.

Everyone piled into their hired jeeps, Hillary and Lara throwing themselves in even as Bryce propelled the vehicle forward, tyres squealing as it sped across the concrete towards the road.

Maria, unused to foreign travelling in lands where driving was on the right, accidentally found herself on the driver's side of their jeep, Gareth automatically taking the other side to her in his hurry and looking amusingly shocked when he realised he was in the passenger's side.

"Go! Just go!" he yelled as Maria squealed that she didn't have the required international driver's permit. "GO!" he shouted again as Lara's jeep rapidly approached the car park exit, and Maria, still squealing, slammed the car into first and lurched it forwards before slamming her foot down on the brake again and screeching that she was going to hit the car on their left.

"I could get a bus in this gap!" Gareth screamed back and, Maria frantically trying to keep the vehicle under her inexperienced control whilst catching up to Bryce, the jeep jerkily bounced towards the exit. "More gas! More gas! You're in the wrong gear!"

Maria wailed at him to shut up and leave her alone, and then hit the brakes hard at the junction with the road as, true to the unofficial Ukraine highway code, a taxi appeared out of nowhere and swerved across in front of them, roaring off into the distance with its suspension still rocking.

Trying to move off again, the car stalled. "Oh god! Let me!" Fishman complained, shoving the only recently qualified driver out of the door and clambering across to take the wheel.

Disappearing rapidly some way down the road, Hillary and Lara turned in their seats and stared out of the back window as Bryce watched in the rear view mirror, the trio shrieking with laughter as the automotive disaster of the Fishman vehicle grew steadily smaller behind them.

"That'll teach the little brat," Bryce grinned.

"I feel almost left out," Hillary said. "I have no rival."

"Oh you do," Lara replied. "Gareth was telling me last night how wonderful Maria is – that not only is she his technical assistant who turned down an international student's place at MIT for computer science, but that she also does all his organisation, cooking, cleaning and helps him with his work-outs. In other words, she's you two rolled in to one and twenty years younger."

"Sounds a precocious little horror," Hillary mused.

Bryce stuck his tongue out distastefully. "Can't drive, though, can she? And I bet she doesn't have a boyfriend. And I could have gone to MIT, y'know, I just couldn't afford it, that's all."

"Boys, boys, nobody could ever better you two or the jobs you do, and I certainly wouldn't swap either of you for a sucking-up bleached blonde who seems to have an attitude problem. And when you want to go to MIT, Brycie, just let me know and I'll pay all your expenses." Lara mussed his hair and grinned teasingly.

"And who would do my job whilst I was gone, eh?"

Hillary snorted in amusement at his own joke. "Maria!"

"Oi!" Bryce shot back, and the jeep continued on towards the coast and the mouth of the river Dnister, some twenty miles away, as the sun began to set over Southern Ukraine.

* * *

The jeep drew up slowly at the water's edge and the engine was cut. 

Bryce stared out over the desolate landscape, cold and dark in the February bleakness. Trees on the bank waved gently and the black water rippled furiously as the surface was whipped by the wind. Streetlights along a footpath behind them cast their glittering yellow on the river, but the opposite bank was in shade, giving the thick foliage an almost menacing quality.

"Oh, what a surprise," Bryce remarked dryly, "Team Croft appear to have made it here first."

Lara grinned at him, opening her door and stepping out. A gust caught her immediately, biting through her leather jacket and streaming her hair out around her face, strands catching on her eyelashes and lips. Pulling them away fruitlessly, she wrapped her jacket tighter around her and hugged herself as Hillary and Bryce came to stand next to her.

"Nice night to call up the dead," Hillary remarked.

* * *

Kurtis fell hard against the wall of the cell as they threw him in, his knees slamming against the floor and his hands and the side of his face connecting painfully with rough brick. His eyes, hooded from the maltreatment before, were now completely shut, his breathing laboured, his consciousness comprehending nothing except the wait for the moment to pass. 

The pain from the fall subsided, leaving him to sense only quiet. No sound, no movement. Just stillness. He was alone.

"Who are you?" came her voice, sweet, feminine, softly spoken and enquiring. Letting out a gasp of discomfort, he forced his eyes open and saw her standing there to his side, her hands held loosely at her front, her head cocked slightly to one side, watching him.

"What do you want?" she probed further.

"Lara," he breathed as his eyelids gave in once again, and when they fluttered back open moments later, she was gone.


	6. New Revelation

**Ooooohhhhh Godvari's gonna go nuts when she reads the end of this chapter, I just know it. Hee Hee.**

Lady Lara Croft - Hello again! Thanks for reviewing. Kurtis' Lara is many things and I will explain her soon, I promise. :-) All I can tell you is that he sees her because he needs her to get through his time with Harding - she's a bit of a lifeline for him. I'm sappy, aren't I? LOL

Godavari - I have got to stop reading your reviews when I'm at work because me bursting out into spontaneous laughter every week when I'm supposed to be working is starting to get a bit suspicious! This chapter is going to have you pulling your hair out, but it's a set-up for a nice explanation that will make the plot a whole lot clearer in the next chapter. I love your reviews, I really do - thanks!

Linzi - Hello back! Hello from er..well, boring Staffordshire. Doesn't quite beat New Hampshire. Enjoy your time there; I lived in Virginia for a while and adored it. The American Milky Way bars are to die for. Thanks for your detailed review and I'm glad you enjoyed it!

Lara-is-my-rolemodel - Hello, stranger! So good to have you back! I'm really happy that you enjoyed No Man's Land - I had a blast writing it and this one is turning out to be just as fun. LOL - no, Kurtis' insanity isn't treating him well, is it? The guy might just be two fries short of a Happy Meal...

_New Revelations_

As if spellbound by the scenery, or maybe there was just an unspoken agreement to hold off from the dabbling in the darker arts, Hillary, Lara and Bryce stood quietly for a few moments, saying nothing and staring at the river's choppy waters as they numbly ignored the cold.

A drawn out squeal of tyres grabbed their attention, and all three turned in the direction of the noise, seeing two lurching headlights beating a speedy and weaving path down the road towards them. The car was clearly in trouble, and the reason became clear when, only a second later, a second set of lights appeared from around an invisible corner, equally hasty and barely held under control, chasing down the first. Engines revved as the cars raced and then the rear vehicle suddenly surged forwards, coming alongside the other and then swerving towards it. Lara, Bryce and Hillary started as the headlights of the first car swung towards them, the vehicle swerving away similarly in order to avoid being hit. Apparently losing control as the wheels left the road and found themselves too quickly contending with bumpy turf, it careered towards them, swinging around at the last moment to avoid hitting them even as they dived away, Hillary crying out in alarm. The car, still unidentifiable in the darkness, growled to a halt as the brakes were sharply applied to avoid the river and the tyres bit deeply into the mud, grass flying up into the headlight beams.

In response to the derailed car, its pursuer shrieked to a halt and then revved loudly as it was quickly turned around and brought off-road, baring down uncaringly upon Bryce who cried out in terror even as Lara's quick reactions sent her diving towards him, pulling him out of harm's way and landing them both in a heap on the cold riverbank as the car stopped abruptly between their jeep and the other car.

The occupants of the first car leapt out, a man shouting instructions to run and hide to a girl yelping as she stumbled on the uneven ground. Their voices were instantly recognisable.

"Fishman?" Lara called out, surprised and confused.

Understandably, he ignored her, instead throwing himself behind his jeep, his actions visible in the lights as the preparation of a gun. His reasons were explained when the driver and two passengers in the second car – a small, souped up model – piled out and took positions, opening fire not only on Fishman and Maria, who was crouching behind a bush, but Lara, Bryce and Hillary as well.

Hillary threw himself to the ground and crawled under their jeep whilst Lara took off at a sprint around to the safe side of the vehicle. Bryce, slightly stunned by the whole affair, jolted back to reality and swore loudly as a bullet exploded a tuft of grass by his foot, and he ran to join Lara and Hillary, Lara delving in her bag for weapons to share between them.

The attackers had their backs up against their own vehicle, standing spread out around it and firing offensively without care for cover or pause to reload on the two groups of victims either side of them. Their position allowed them poor shots at the Croft group, whose Jeep was angled away, and no line at all to Fishman. Maria, however, was well within their grasp if only they would realise behind which bush she was hidden.

"Maria!" Gareth called over the din, "Get over here!" He bobbed up to take a few shots at the enemy and glanced back over his shoulder between bullets as he shouted, "Maria! Now!"

Doing as she was told, she scurried over to Gareth, who reached and grabbed her hand as soon as she was in reach, pulling her to the ground and hugging her head to his chest for a moment before letting go and allowing her to crouch next to him. Her movement attracted attention and the passenger window above her head shattered as a bullet made contact, the glass raining down on Maria, who screamed, her whole body shaking as her hands went rigid at each side of her face.

"Here!" Fishman shouted over the noise, and he fumbled to pull a small gun from a leg holster. With shaking hands the girl took the weapon, looking at it with a sort of terror. "Maria," Fishman said forcefully, repeating the word and grabbing her chin to make her look at him when she didn't at first respond, "Maria, you can do this. Stay calm, keep under cover." Letting go of her face, he pushed her lightly to his side and she obediently and meekly moved, crawling into position with one hand clutching onto the door handle as though she was unable to keep herself upright.

Lara, far more experienced in the matters of non-simulated combat, bobbed up and leant her outstretched arms over the bonnet of her car and began firing shot after shot at the shadows that attacked them, squinting with her head drawn down into her shoulders from the noise and the danger. Though it was hard to judge depth properly against the glaring car headlights in the dark night sky, her aim apparently ran true as a cry of pain rang out amid the gunfire and one of the silhouetted attackers facing her position fell awkwardly to the ground, clutching his thigh.

Hillary took a different approach, easily shooting out the car window behind another opponent that was concentrating his efforts on Fishman and Maria, the shattering glass sending him dropping to the ground with his hands covering his head.

Maria and Fishman were still firing but when the short loss of two of the men thanks to Lara and Hillary provided them with an opening, Gareth shouted to Maria to cover for him as he stood up and ran, jamming a boot down on the man only just beginning to rise from the broken glass and keeping his gun trained on his head.

Realising that their victims had begun to take on the offence, the third attacker took off for a new position, but Bryce, closest to him, leapt into action. He sprinted off after the man, making a perfect shot as he was running to injure the man's foot and bring him down before Bryce fell to his knees and straddled the man's chest, gun trained on the surprised attacker's forehead.

Silence descended on the riverbank as everyone realised that the battle had been won. Lara and Hillary left their cover, the butler going to cover the gunman with the injured leg as Lara made for Fishman. Gareth kept his gun aimed on his prisoner but spared a glance towards Maria, who was tentatively peeking out from behind her jeep with a faint tear track running down her cheek.

"Maria, come on out." He held a hand out towards her and waved her to him. She gingerly walked over, sniffing back a tear. Gareth tugged her to his side and gave her a one-armed hug. "You did good, kid."

"Fishman," Lara interrupted impatiently. "What's going on?"

Gareth glanced up before returning his attention to the gunman, his voice showing anger as he answered. "Well, actually I was about to ask you the same thing."

"Don't look at me, this is nothing to do with us."

"Well then who are they?"

"I don't know!"

Bryce's voice halted the argument. "Maybe we should ask them?"

Lara and Fishman looked up, noticing whom Bryce was referring to. Silently and, it seemed, instantaneously, another group of at least twenty in black combats and balaclavas had appeared and taken positions, surrounding the raiders on three sides with the river on the fourth, semi automatic weapons all pointed steadily on their targets. "They just appeared from the bank on the other side of the road," Hillary said. "We must not have heard them arrive under the gunfire."

Lara let out a breath of resignation, turning to face the group with her gun held limply at her side, not dropped but not challenging. "What's going on?" she asked, her eyes scanning for a leader.

"Leave this place." A figure stepped forward into the light and pulled off its balaclava, revealing long blonde hair that flopped over slight shoulders and a woman's face in delicate make up. "Go back to your hotels and do not return. We will be here guarding the river until morning." Her accent was local but her English commendable.

"You want to stop us performing the ritual?" Gareth asked, confused. Lara hissed in annoyance; if they didn't know about the ritual before then they did now.

"Go," the woman repeated, ignoring his question. "Or we kill you all."

"In case you hadn't noticed," Lara said, "we have three of your men at gunpoint."

"You kill them if we don't drop our weapons?" She shrugged. "You underestimate me if you think that that will change my mind."

"You'll let your men die?"

"I won't let their lives be held over me. Now go, or we start with the girl." She nodded towards Maria, still shaken and clinging onto Fishman.

Gareth nodded, conceding defeat, and let his weapon drop. "Let this one go, Lara," he said, and then turned and prodded Maria towards their jeep.

Lara glared but she knew that he was right. They'd lost this one. She nodded acceptance to Hillary and Bryce and made for her own vehicle.

The militants watched coldly as Lara eased her jeep back onto the road, following on behind Fishman's. She returned their stares stonily, her jaw set in anger, and yanked the wheel hard to straighten the vehicle with a jerk.

The journey passed in silence for several minutes until Lara, wanting some distraction, asked, "Where did you learn to do that, Bryce?"

"What? That oh-so-flawless shooting the guy in the foot whilst we're both running and holding a gun to his head with an air of dashing menace, thing? That totally suave move that probably had you weak at the knees?"

In her antagonised state Lara only managed a wry smile in return for his light joke. Hillary was equally frustrated with the whole affair. "Dumb luck," he sniped.

"Hillary," Lara said shortly, in no mood for their bickering. "I thought it was very good, Bryce, well done."

"I've been practising in your Shoot Out 2000 whilst it was still in the prototype stages," Bryce muttered, turning away and staring out of the window, upset with Hillary's intolerance of his attempt to cheer his friends up.

Several more minutes of silence followed and a heavy rain took up, spattering down on the windshield as fast as the wipers could smear it away. Lara turned up the heater but didn't slow down, barrelling through the dark, rainy night faster than was advisable on the dark roads. It wasn't late, but it felt like it and the streets were almost deserted. Their empty racetracks made good outlets for her anger.

Bryce tired of the uncomfortable quiet and, sighing short temperedly, let his hand drop to his lap from where his fingers had been resting against his mouth. "So who were they?"

"I don't know."

"Did your research reference any protectors of the gate or anything?" Hillary asked. "Maybe they're an old order, like the Lux Veritatis, charged with keeping Hades hidden."

"No." Bryce sounded fed up. "Nothing to suggest that."

"I didn't see them wearing any symbols or insignia," Lara said, "they just looked like mercenaries or soldiers."

"Maybe they were."

"And why would they be interested in stopping us?" Bryce asked Hillary.

"Maybe _they_ weren't. But whoever hired them might be."

Lara decided they were getting carried away. "I think it's a bit early to be making useless guesses. We need to know more and we need it to be grounded in reality, not guesswork. Let's just get back to the hotel, see if Fishman knows anything, and go over the research again to see if we've missed anything. I'd like to know who they are before I kill them. No-one is going to stop me from performing that ritual. No-one."

* * *

Lara and her companions sat with Maria in a corner booth in the hotel bar, the dim light and ambient noise masking their slightly secretive meeting. Gareth appeared at their table with two drinks in hand and slid into his seat. He held a half-pint glass of coke out to Maria. "Here," he said, "there's vodka in that, it'll calm you down." She took the glass and took a swallow, letting out a tense breath afterwards.

Bryce, Hillary and Lara watched the pair, taking in Gareth's ministrations as he tucked Maria's hair behind her ear and Maria's still-shaken appearance. Lara took a sip of her own drink, a much harder concoction than vodka and coke.

"What do you think we should do?" she asked quietly.

"Honestly?" Gareth asked. "I think we should go home."

"A woman with a gun is going to scare you away? No wonder you've not hit the tombraiding headlines recently, if that's your attitude."

"Lara." Gareth leaned forward, enforcing his point. "They are a _small army_ with _lots of guns_ and they are more than capable of killing us all."

"I've faced worse."

"Yes, well, you never had a young girl to look after, did you?"

"Hey," Maria complained, hitting Gareth's arm, her shock forgotten.

"Don't be silly, Maria," Fishman said, brushing her off. "You're just starting out, no-one expects you to handle it like a pro." He turned back to Lara. "We don't even know that the ritual's going to work, and if it does – is there _really_ going to be a helmet of invisibility at the end of it? Tomb raiding is an unsure business and I'm not sure I'm willing to go on faith on this one."

"Fine." Bryce broke in, leaning back in his seat casually and taking a sip of his drink before continuing. "Go home. At least then we won't have to fight over the prize, will we?"

"We're not going anywhere," Maria spat. "That helmet is ours."

"Maria!" Gareth warned. "Look," he said, turning back to speak to the others, "let's try and figure out what we're up against before we make any rash decisions, alright? Does _anybody_ have any idea who they could be?"

"We thought they might be hired militia," Hillary said. "Somebody else wants to stop us, maybe."

"Another raider?" Maria asked. "Maybe one who's a bit behind?"

Gareth smirked and looked to Lara knowingly. "The only raider I can think of that would be useless enough to be late and rash enough to get mercenaries to hold the fort for him would be Chen and last I heard he was too busy partying in Mexico to worry about supplementing the income he was blowing."

"When was the last time _he_ was sober?" Lara laughed.

Thoughtful silence descended on the table for a few moments and then Maria stood, silently asking Fishman to let her out of the booth. "I'm just going to the bathroom."

The others watched her leave the bar as Gareth flopped back down. "I can't help thinking she's too young for me to be dragging her into this," Gareth said.

"How old is she?" Hillary asked.

"Nineteen, but she's far cleverer than her years. She was determined to get out and make her mark on the world and no-one was going to stop her."

Bryce, not at all interested in the welfare of the wonderful Maria, jumped in with a change of subject. "Look, I'll go and scour the internet for any mention of a mercenary group in Ukraine – they've got to advertise themselves somehow."

"Take Maria with you," Fishman ordered. "She can help you."

"I don't need any bratty kids holding me back, thank you."

"Maybe not," Fishman said, standing to leave, "but I want you to keep an eye on her whilst I make some calls and see who's doing what in the tomb raiding world. Lara, coming with?"

Lara nodded, prodding Bryce to stand and let her out and, in turn, Hillary. "Bryce, look after Maria," and then, as Bryce opened his mouth to protest, "No arguments! We've a lot of phone calls to make and you'll get the work done twice as fast with her help. Hillary, do you think you feel up to going into town and tracking down the undesirables to see if you can dig anything up?"

Hillary nodded, happy to help. "Alright."

"Take a phone and be careful," Lara warned. "Actually, on second thoughts, find a guide to accompany you."

"Will do," Hillary agreed, and he tapped Bryce's shoulder to attract his attention before they left to start their business.

"Right," Lara said, walking off, "let's go and find out just what's going on."

* * *

Four hours later Lara dropped her phone back into its cradle and stood, walking into Fishman's room and rifling through her notes as she did so. She sat down on the bed next to him. "The majority of our colleagues have missed this particular mission. Chen, as you said, seems to have forsaken raiding for partying, Patel is giving this one a miss because he's broken his leg, and the others either don't know about the Styx being found or are on completely the wrong track and are hitting several dead ends over on the banks of the Dnipro. None of them seem to have hired our mystery army.

"Same here," Fishman said, "though I've found out that Sonya Payne reckons the Styx is actually a brook in Greece. She always was clueless, that woman." He let out a long breath and fell backwards, lying flat on the pillows. "Of course, we could have found all that out in about fifteen minutes if we'd just asked people directly but I suppose you have to be subtle."

At that moment the door opened and Maria and Bryce dragged themselves in, tired and eye-strained from their extended cyber surfing. They flopped into nearby chairs, Maria closing her eyes and settling back into the cushions.

"Absolutely bugger all," Bryce said, rubbing his eyes tiredly. "We'll try again tomorrow but right now I really think that bed is a good idea."

"Alright," Lara agreed, nodding. She picked up the phone and dialled Hillary's number, waiting for him to answer. "Hillary, did you find anything out?" she asked, and then listened to his reply. "Alright then, come home, we'll get some sleep and decide what to do tomorrow." She hung up. "Nothing," she said to the room, "either we have better luck tomorrow or we'll just have to find a way to work around them."

"Not that I'm saying that you're not subtle or anything, Croft, but let's try not to just kill them all, eh?" Fishman said jokingly.

* * *

The pain of his head hitting the floor of his cell sharply as they threw him back in barely registered to Kurtis. Pain was all he was feeling now, every waking moment was suffering. He was almost used to it, had almost learnt to ignore it; it wasn't shooting agony down every nerve ending, he had felt that before and was more than familiar with the burning, but quickly subsiding, sensation, but it was duller - the throbbing, consistent kind of pain from a crippling migraine or broken bone, just as intense but in a different, more enduring sense.

Raising his head slowly, his gaze swept out across the floor and then caught on something – a slight glint in the early evening dusk, shining dully out from the corner of the room. Gasping almost in delight, he forgot his pain and scrabbled across the floor towards it, snatching it up and cradling it in his hands with an almost maniacal love. It was a shard of glass, thick and green from a wine bottle, unnoticed until now among the dirt and dust. He ran his fingers along its edges. They weren't particularly sharp but with enough force they'd do.

"My precious," he joked to himself, laughing quietly with a sense of humour twisted by his ordeal, and caressing the fragment gently.

He pushed himself slowly to his feet, never removing his eyes from the glass, and then squeezed it between his fingers before experimentally stroking it down the length of his wrist, straining his eyes to follow the light trail of dislodged skin cells against the fading light. It tickled almost, the touch was so light, and he focused on it, finding it as intensely interesting as only one driven to breaking point can. He steeled himself then, grasping the shard even tighter, and brought it towards his wrist.

"Who are you?" she asked, her voice interrupting him from behind. He stopped, the edge hovering above his vein. "What do you want?" she enquired again.

He blinked, suddenly losing interest in the objective in which only moments before he had been so determined. Somehow, her voice hadn't held the same quiet compassion it had before. The shard was tossed carelessly to the side, where it chinked against the floor, and he spun and sank down with his back against the wall, eyes half closed and unsurprised to see with his narrowed vision an empty room. He was tired and he was almost past feeling, and so without tears or anxiety he closed his eyes to sleep, but someone didn't want him to.

He unconsciously reacted to the sound of something slicing the air as it flew, and he opened his eyes only to squeeze them shut again before he even realised what was happening. A sharp stabbing pain exploded in his right temple, accompanied by the clattering of something falling to the floor and he scrambled to his knees, startled to find the previously abandoned glass shard coming to rest on the floor of the cell, the blood that it had drawn flowing freely down the side of his face.

"Who are you?" she demanded, and he looked up to find her standing over him with a murderous intent in her eyes and her face more angry than he had ever seen it. He gasped, backing up into the corner of his cell, genuinely afraid. "What do you want?"

He dropped to a crouch in the corner, shielding his face with his arms and squeezing his eyes shut, terrified in his broken state. A few moments passed and nothing more happened, nor was there any sound. Slowly, he lowered his arms and cracked open an eye, checking that she had gone, but she was still standing there.

Now, though, she appeared calmer and – she had changed. The clothes she wore were no longer those of their first meeting; they were brown shorts and a green top. Her hair was mussed and her body dusty, bruised and bloodied. This was how she'd looked when the pyramid had collapsed on her in Egypt, wasn't it?

"Who are you?" she asked, her earlier patient demeanour returned, "What do you want?"

Kurtis slowly stood, no longer cowed by her or Harding, a far away memory rooting in his mind. "It's alright," he said. "I remember now."

She smiled warmly, pleased with his answer.

Before he could act upon his newly realised direction, the door to the basement opened and light flooded in from the upper floor. She and Kurtis' attentions were snatched to the door as two guards started down the steps. He stood ready, holding his hands through the bars to be cuffed, and walked proud and without struggle when they led him away from his cell, leaving her behind.

* * *

It was late and Lara couldn't sleep. She lay there in the dark, staring at the red fluorescence of the clock by her bed as the minutes of the early hours ticked by. She felt angry and frustrated that her plans had been derailed by the mysterious woman, and though she and Fishman had always had a healthy rivalry between them she wasn't too thrilled about having to pool her resources with him. She knew that they were far more likely to succeed if they united against the common enemy, but it was hardly a situation conducive to selfish claiming of the prize at the end.

She sighed and resettled against the pillows, closing her eyes even though she felt wide-awake. It was strange, then that she apparently fell immediately asleep.

_Lara stood on the bank of the river, deep darkness all around her and the silence punctuated only by the gentle lapping of the water against the banks. Her past self stood before her, dressed in the clothes she had worn whilst fighting to banish Seth and showing the bloody injuries and ingrained dust that had caked her body when the pyramid had fallen._

"_He is the key," She said. "He remembers now. He sees me for who I really am. He is coming. You must save him."_

"_Who?" Lara asked. "Who are you talking about?"_

"_Man is not meant to be immortal. Save him, so that he might save you."_

_Lara's surroundings began to shimmer and lose coherence and She smiled warmly at her as She began to fade with them._

"_Wait!" Lara cried, reaching out to stop her vision, but it was no use._

Gasping in shock, Lara's eyes snapped open and she found herself in her hotel room, cold winter sunlight streaming through the window. Slowly, she sat up, trying to figure out just what it was she had just been dreaming. No explanation came easily, so she shook her head to fully wake herself up and then got out of bed. She'd tell Hillary and Bryce over breakfast.

**So just what is it that Kurtis has remembered? Who's this weird Dream Lara chick? And just what the hell is going on! I promisethat the next chapter will make things awhole lot clearer. If you're up on Greek mythology you may have figured out the Dream Lara one already. :-)**


	7. Contrasts of Reactions

**_This_ should explain a few things. :-)**

**NFI - Hi! You're not too far off...not too far off at all. :-)**

**ColorGuard Girl - Hello there, new reviewer! I admit, yes, sometimes I waffle, but sometimes I post paragraphs that _seem_ superfluous at the time, only to become important later. I hope I've not done too much of the former, and I'm sorry you're finding this a tad tiresome. I'm sure you'll be glad to know that today Kurtis' story takes a new turn. I needed to stretch his incarceration out as long as I did so that I could fully illustrate his physical and mental deterioration whilst driving home the repetitiveness of Lara's questions. Thanks for giving an honest review!**

**Linzi - Well, I'm glad I'm drawing you into the plot! LOL. I'll try not to scare you again, but I might not be able to resist - I'm remarkably evil sometimes. ;-) Yeah, Fishman and Maria are cute, aren't they?**

**Lady Lara Croft - Well, it seems you aren't the only one who liked the shoot out! And yep, the references to the TR4 Lara are so totally there for a reason.**

**Odd Little Turtle - What's a chapter without a cliffhanger, eh! ;-)**

**Godavari - I accept no responsibility for grounding, failure of pop quizzes or incompletion of homework! LOL Thanks for choosing this story over sleep!**

_Contrasts of Reactions_

As he was led back through the now familiar corridors at the back of the club, Kurtis wondered why they'd come to fetch him when not ten minutes before they'd thrown him in his cell. He was startled out of his musings when, as he was automatically turning right around a corner, his arms were jerked by the guards and they dragged him left instead. A few more steps down the corridor and he found himself standing outside a brown panelled door, waiting for an answer to the guard's knock.

"Come in!" came an unfamiliar voice from inside, and so they entered.

Kurtis found himself in a large office, an unexpected size in comparison to the rest of the club he'd seen. A rich red carpet covered the central portion of the floor, with a frame of polished white tiles poking out from underneath around the outside. Black bookcases lined one wall, a black leather couch and two matching chairs were squared onto the opposite wall, whilst huge windows looking out onto an adjacent park dominated the far end. In the centre of the room was a modern glass and marble desk, Vincent Harding sat on one side. He wasn't however, on the boss's side of it. That seat was occupied by someone else, a man that Kurtis hadn't seen before. Looking to be in his early thirties, the man was casually but expensively dressed, in black suit trousers with a purple silk shirt, worn out of the waistband and unbuttoned on the top, no tie to adorn it.

"Mr Trent," the man said. "Come in, sit down. You look tired, weak even. Have you been fed?"

Kurtis, still handcuffed, was given a little push forwards, and he stumbled before regaining his balance and walking warily forwards. The man shot Harding a hard look and Vincent, a flash of annoyance on his face, did as he was told and vacated the seat for Kurtis. Trent sat, only half on the seat and sitting up straight to avoid crushing his hands. They may as well have uncuffed him, he was far too weak to use any telekinesis, had been for most of his time with them. It was infuriating, having an ability that could make escape so easy but being unable to conjure it.

"Do you know why you're here?"

"I'm sorry?"

"Why we've kidnapped you. Do you know why we've got you?"

"No." Kurtis did his best to sound bored.

The man leant forwards across the desk, holding his cigarette away from Kurtis politely as he offered the pack forth to him. Trent looked longingly at the white sticks poking from the box and, laughing to himself, the man took one out and lit it before standing to lean over and place it between Kurtis' lips. He took a thankful drag, closing his eyes as the calming effect of the nicotine washed over him.

"My name," the man continued, "is Travis Sunderland. I own this nightclub. I'm a very rich, powerful man." He gestured to the guards and Harding as he did so, to prove his point. "I'm young, I'm wealthy, I'm good-looking, I'm well educated, I've got a head for business and a heart for fun – and I'm dying."

He looked to Kurtis for a response but he only stared back incomprehensively, blowing smoke out of his lips as he gripped the cigarette with his teeth.

"You're here to save my life," Sunderland said.

A moment of silence followed and then Travis stood, pacing thoughtfully around the office. "I need you to remember that ritual, Kurtis, and I need you to do it fast. We know that it has to be performed at the Dnister in Ukraine, and we don't have an unlimited amount of time. _I _don't have an unlimited amount of time. Now in two hours our plane leaves for Kiev. We will be on it. Within twelve we'll be in Ukraine and if you haven't remembered how to perform that ritual – if indeed you _have_ forgotten as you claim – then you'll regret it deeply." He turned, fixing Kurtis with a cold stare that did not match his cultured appearance. "Lady Croft will regret it."

Kurtis failed to hide his surprise. He spat the cigarette onto the desk and glared back at Sunderland. "What about Lara?" he demanded.

"We can get to her. Quite easily."

Cursing himself for giving away his weakness to Harding in a cry of desperation, Kurtis panicked. "You lay one finger on her – "

"Just perform the ritual. It's that simple."

Kurtis thought for a second. "The Ritual of Anubis is used to contact the afterlife – how does that help you? What, you wanna reserve your room there?"

Travis laughed to himself, half genuinely amused, half decided that Kurtis was an idiot. "The Ritual of Anubis can be used to open the gateway to Hades, turning the River Dnister into the River Styx. Anyone brave enough to drink from the Styx's boiling waters, so legend says, has their mortality washed away. They never die." He turned to stare out of the window, almost wistful.

Kurtis blinked disbelievingly. "And you believe that?"

Travis turned. "What choice do I have? It's my final chance. Take my advice, my friend, give up the cigarettes." He took a long drag of his own and laughed bitterly.

* * *

"Ah!" Crying out in frustration, Bryce slammed the lid of his laptop closed. "This is ridiculous!" 

Across the room, Lara spared him a sideways glance and returned to cleaning her pistol. "It's alright, Bryce."

"Alright? Lara, these mercenaries, soldiers, whatever they are, they're untraceable! I can't find them! Me! Do you know how annoying that is!"

"Yes," Lara said succinctly as she gave the exterior of the gun chamber an aesthetic polish. "We don't know who they are, where they come from, who hired them, or why. It's remarkably annoying, I agree. Which is why we're going to stop looking and start acting. If they're back guarding the river again tonight," – she slammed a new clip into the weapon and pumped the chamber – "then we stand our ground."

Bryce stared, taking in her combat clothes, toned physique, familiar handling of her weapons and her no-nonsense demeanour. "God, you're hot – you know that?"

Lara winked and flounced out of the room.

* * *

Fishman, Maria, Lara, Bryce and Hillary had all taken the one jeep and left it at the end of the road around the corner, creeping the remainder of the way to the riverbank under the cover of darkness and dropping to their stomachs behind one of the many bushes, silently staring at the mercenaries who had, as expected, returned to guard the waters. This time, however, they weren't alone. 

"Helloooo," Fishman said to himself, taking in the newcomers. The soldiers were standing around holding a perimeter, scanning the area with their weapons ready, but their female leader was off towards their vehicle, deep in conversation with another group of people, too tightly clustered to be counted or recognised.

"Well, whoever they are, they're probably the people that hired the mercenaries," Hillary whispered.

"So what do we do?" Maria asked.

Lara smiled, reaching down to her holster and removing her gun, bringing it up to her face and dropping a quick kiss on its barrel. "I'm feeling gung-ho," she grinned. "I say we take them by surprise."

* * *

Gunfire exploded all around him and for a momentKurtis was frozen in shock before he returned to his senses, diving for cover behind the car even as those with him regained their own faculties and shoved him in the direction of safety. Unable to properly move with his hands bound behind his back and his ankles tied by rope with only a short amount of give, Kurtis fell hard by the wheels of the car, his captors dropping to their knees around him. 

"What the fuck is going on!" Sunderland demanded, and Kurtis shot him a withering look from his position sprawled in the grass.

"We're being shot at, what do you think?"

Olena, the mercenary leader that only moments before had been discussing tactics with them, had opened return fire within a split second of the attack beginning and was now out in the middle of the foray, keeping herself moving and firing blindly on the enemy that seemed to be attacking from all sides, invisible in the darkness. She screamed something in Ukrainian and, gaining no immediate response, repeated it in angry English. "I said turn off the headlights!"

One of Kurtis' guards had the presence of mind to act upon the order and yanked open the door of the vehicle, scrambling inside and flicking off the lights before finding his gun in his belt and opening the car window, firing through it into the fight. The other guard moved to the end of the car and opened fire from there, staying low and covered in direct contrast to the lunatic antics of the professionals who were out in the open and dodging bullets seemingly by the very skill of their movements. Only Kurtis, Sunderland and the ever-present Harding remained neutral, crouched down and covering their ears against the deafening gunshots.

From their view over the car they saw one of their aggressors dash out in the open, skidding to a halt just long enough to fire, a gun in each hand, at a chosen mercenary until they dropped dead, then running off again before they themselves could become anyone's target. In the meagre light from the streetlamps of the nearby road, the figure's form was clearly female, and a long braid streamed out behind them as they sprinted for cover.

"Lara…" Kurtis breathed, a delighted smile breaking out.

"Lara Croft?" Sunderland cried, overhearing. "I might have known!" He watched helplessly for a few moments as more of the mercenaries fell, Lara and her unfallen team using the advantage of cover and surprise to its full advantage.

"Stop her," Sunderland demanded, turning to Kurtis, his eyes desperate. "Use your powers, stop them! They're winning!"

"Why should I! I want her to win!"

"Because," growled Harding from behind him, and he turned to see the man holding a grenade with a vicious look in his eyes, "if you don't stop her, I'll pull the pin, throw it and blow us all to kingdom come."

"Are you crazy!" Kurtis shouted, struggling against his bonds. "You are! You're insane!"

"Do it!" Sunderland screamed, forcing Kurtis to spin back again. "You think she'll let me drink from the river if she wins? If we lose, I die, and if I die, I'm taking you with me! All of you!" He snatched the grenade from Harding and wrapped his fingers around the pin. "Stop her!"

Kurtis snarled in frustration, trapped. "Fine!" he shouted, thrusting his hands towards Harding to be freed. "Fine, I'll do it!"

Harding snatched a knife from his pocket and flicked open the blade, snapping the twines binding Kurtis' ankles before pulling a key from another pocket and hastily unlocking the handcuffs. Immediately Kurtis leapt to his feet, grunting in exertion as he slammed a hand forward and sent eight of the mercenaries flying. Fishman was caught in the blast, crying out as the invisible force knocked him backwards and he had barely hit the ground before a second wave from Kurtis downed the remaining mercenaries and Lara, the woman grunting as the unseen punch contacted with her stomach and threw her to the ground. Trent spun around three quarters of a turn, channelling the momentum of the movement into one final thrust and yelling a battle cry as his powers swept across the field, taking out anyone left standing and leaving the area silent and dark, devoid from gunfire and muzzle flares.

"Move!" Sunderland shouted to the soldiers, "Get them!" Quick and combat ready as they had already proven themselves to be, the hired help scrambled to their feet and tackled the tombraiders as they and their assistants rolled to their knees and took off at runs.

The capture was quickly over and Lara, Fishman, Maria, Bryce and Hillary, struggling vainly and complaining loudly, were roughly grabbed and held firm, their arms painfully gripped as their weapons were snatched away.

Breathing heavily from the exertion, Kurtis came to stand in front of them as Sunderland and Harding ran over from their cover behind the vehicle. Harding landed a kick to the back of Kurtis' knees, sending him plummeting to the ground, and pushed down hard on the back of his neck to render him powerless as his other hand hurriedly returned the handcuffs to Trent's wrists.

"Kurtis!" Lara cried out in surprise.

Harding's hand now moved to pinch his shoulder, Kurtis raised his head and looked back at her apologetically, slight humour in his eyes. "Well, I should've _known_ you'd be here."

"So this is your excuse for not calling me on my birthday, then?"

Kurtis smiled and attempted a shrug. "Sorry."

"Well, you could at least tell me what's going on."

"Lady Croft!" In answer, Sunderland stepped forward and extended a hand in greeting, smiling sheepishly and withdrawing it as he realised that Lara was in no position to shake hands. "My name is Travis Sunderland."

"Really?" Lara looked unimpressed.

"Sorry for the inconvenience, but I really need the Styx for myself."

"Are you _trying_ to make sense?" Bryce asked sarcastically.

"Sorry." Sunderland laughed. "You see, I want to open the gateway to Hades so that I can turn the Dnister back into the Styx and make myself immortal."

To her credit, Lara managed to remain looking thoroughly bored. "And the reason for that is…?"

"I'm dying! And I don't want to, it's as simple as that, really."

"So you hired this lot to keep us from opening the gateway until you could get here and do it first," Fishman said. "I don't get it – if all you want to do is drink from the Styx, why the chase? The gateway can be opened as many times as necessary, it's not like we'd be stopping you."

"You know your mythology," Travis said, smiling and pointing. "You're right, of course. However, what you apparently don't know is that the ritual can only be performed by a Lux Veritatis warrior, and we've got the last one of those right here." He patted Kurtis on the shoulder, still smiling amiably, and Lara just couldn't quite match his manner with his actions. "At first, that didn't bother me – whilst all you tombraiders were running around without a clue, either getting the wrong river or getting the right river but not having your Lux Veritatis warriors, you weren't a threat. But then Kurtis kindly told us what good friends you all were and I suddenly realised that as soon as you tried the ritual and it didn't work, you'd do more digging. You'd find out who you needed and instead of running around trying to figure out who the last Lux Veritatis warrior was, you'd immediately come looking for Kurtis Trent. He's in my hands, the trail leads you directly to me, you get angry that I've kidnapped him, you decide not to play nice and share the Styx with me…you can see why I had to stop you."

Hillary looked thoroughly bemused. "You go to quite some extremes, do you know that?"

"You're telling me," Kurtis muttered. "Why the hell he couldn't just _ask_ me, I don't know."

Travis bent down and looked Kurtis directly in the eyes, grinning. "Same reason I'm not going to offer to share the Styx with you all now – I don't really want any witnesses to all the crimes I've committed to get this far. You'd be surprised how illegal it can be to engineer yourself a last chance, sometimes. Hired help, untraceable guns, killing people just to get the information you need…I'll be damned if I'm going to get my life back only to spend it in prison!"

"No witnesses? You're going to kill us?" Lara sounded disbelieving rather than frightened. "This just gets better and better…"

It was Sunderland's turn to smile and shrug. "Sorry!"

"Up we get!" Vincent grabbed a handful of Kurtis' shirt and pulled him to his feet before giving him a shove towards to the two guards, who caught him. "Come on," Harding said impatiently, striding forwards and parting the crowd as he made for the river. His sense of humour inappropriately timed as always, he sniggered to himself. "Dead man walking!"

"You're an idiot, Harding," Kurtis said witheringly. He was pushed forwards a couple of steps at the edge of the bank and those soldiers not holding Lara and the others prisoner trained their weapons on him as his handcuffs were removed.

"I'll be needing some certain items," Kurtis demanded. "I'm assuming Lara has them?"

Harding marched over to Lara and tore open her backpack, reaching inside and picking out the contents one by one, throwing them to the ground. A small wooden frame with some kind of animal skin scrap hanging from the top bar, a small golden statue of Osiris, the Egyptian god of the dead, firelighters and matches, and a screw-top jar holding a pink powder that looked grey in the moonlight were removed before Harding got down to weapons, flares, first aid kits. "That's all," Kurtis said, watching the proceedings. "Bring 'em over here."

Harding did so and Kurtis took the items from him and tucked them under one arm before holding out his free hand. "I need your knife." Harding hesitated and looked to Sunderland, who jerked his head in agreement.

Trent set about preparing the ritual, moving quickly to a nearby bush and snapping off some dry twigs before joining them with the firelighters and igniting a small bonfire. As the flames took hold he set the animal skin to the side and placed the statue behind the fire. Unscrewing the lid of the jar, he sprinkled out a circle around himself and the objects before he took a pinch of the powder and threw it onto the flames, resulting in a crackling explosion like fireworks that sent a jet of flames up into the night sky.

"I call on you, Anubis, keeper of the dead. Rise and bow before my command. Open the gate." He threw more powder onto the fire and the flames leapt higher. "I call on you, Anubis, keeper of the dead. Rise and bow before my command. Open the gate," he repeated, his voice louder, and then a third lot of powder was added. The fire roared into a furnace, the flames higher and hotter than any natural burn from such a small source, their crackling and snapping almost drowning out Kurtis' words as he shouted the phrase one last time.

He snatched up the knife and held it to his palm, his hand hovering above thewaiting animal skin. Those watching were holding their breaths, barely believing what they were seeing and waiting in stark anticipation for what seemed to be the final action of the ritual. Kurtis froze, only his chest rising and falling in deep breaths, a long moment of hesitancy stretching the atmosphere to breaking point.

"What are you waiting for!" Sunderland cried. "You said you'd remembered!"

Kurtis raised his eyes to his captor, his gaze dark and threatening from underneath the strands of tousled hair hanging about his bowed head. "I did remember," he growled. "I remembered who I was, and what I wanted."


	8. Beneath The Surface

**This chapter starts off right where the last one finished, so if you need to refresh your memory flick back and re-read the last paragraph - continuity will add a lot to the flow of this chapter.**

**SilverDragon - Since when did I not finish on annoying cliffhangers? ;-) **

NFI - Why, thankyou very much! I'm glad you like my work so much. :-)

**Linzi - If you think that was action packed, get a load of this...! Yep, Kurtis and Lara back together again. I just love writing their interactions.**

**Lady Lara Croft - Gosh, I'm a bad influence on you all, aren't I? LOL I guess the reason behind Kurtis' words is kinda dark, but in a delicious kind of way. I'm only going to hint at what he means for now, but rest assured all will be properly explained by the end of the story.**

**Lara-is-my-rolemodel - Yeah, Go Kurtis! And even more so in this update... I'm glad you liked the scene in Sunderland's office - Travis starts out as such a nice person... I have to admit, the fries and Happy Meal quote belongs to Stargate SG1, not me. Along with various other O'Neill-isms from the show, it's a part of my daily language now. Heh.**

**Thanks for reviewing, everyone! Always loved. Feedback on what happens to Fishman in this chapter, please - with the plot of this story, anything could happen, and I'm not sureifhis little predicament should be permanent or not.You'll see what I mean. ;-)**

_Beneath The Surface_

"What!" Sunderland was confused, desperate for Kurtis to complete the ritual. "What are you talking about!"

Kurtis continued to regard him with a calculating gaze from his bowed head, his teeth bared slightly in the look of a man consumed by a vicious warrior instinct. "You'll see," he snarled.

His left hand jerked and the knife bit fiercely into his right palm, a small cry of pain escaping his lips. Breathing out harshly, he flicked his hand forcefully and several drops of blood flew from his skin, splattering onto the animal skin below them.

Stormy clouds rolled in across the moon from out of nowhere, thunder rumbling across the skies and flashes of lightning strobing across those gathered at the river.

Lara gasped, her eyes widening in disbelief as gusts of wind snatched her hair from her braid and flicked it into her face where it was plastered against her cheeks by the rain beating down. It wasn't just the events of the ritual, she'd seen enough mythology spring to life in her time; it was Kurtis.

Previously frozen in place with his gaze fixed upon Sunderland as the storm began to rage around him, he now dived into action. He spun the knife in his hand and shoved it into his belt with the skill of an old expert and then advanced upon the others there with a murderous intent in his eyes. Panicking, prisoners forgotten, the soldiers dropped Lara and the others and scrabbled for their weapons, overcome by a terror uncharacteristic to such hardened combatants as themselves. Lara stumbled as she was shoved away to make a clear line of fire but she found her footing and stood her ground, staring at Kurtis with amazement as he stalked towards them. Knowing Kurtis as she did she was sure that his anger was not directed at her or her friends, but the others were not so sure and Fishman grabbed Maria's hand and began to back them away, fumbling for his gun as Hillary and Bryce, lacking Lara's confidence, scrambled out of Kurtis' path.

The mercenaries opened fire at last, fingers pressed down on triggers in a constant stream of bullets, but it was useless. The Lux Veritatis only continued to march forwards undeterred, the bullets fading into nothingness as they neared his chest. He thrust his arm forwards and Lara braced herself for the invisible impact, but none came. Cries sounded around her and she stared around, eyes darting in shock, as she saw the mercenaries flying backwards through the air, limbs flailing as they and only they succumbed to Kurtis' telekinesis. Her eyes returned to him, locking onto his but receiving no gaze in return.

The thundering of waves attracted everyone's attention and screams of terror rang out as the waters of the nearby sea erupted upwards, the continual sparking of lightning reflecting off the chaotic waters as the wavefronts crashed back down again, revealing in their midst a rising, dripping giant of glistening ebony skin, golden features, and the head of a jackal. Anubis.

All except Kurtis were frozen by shock and fear, lying prone on the ground or ready to run on their feet, staring up at the impossible entity. Kurtis turned and dropped to his knees, head bowed in a show of subservience.

The creature spoke, its voice ear splitting with volume. "For I am your servant; your voice rouses me from my slumber. Arise, messenger of my lord. The Gates are open."

Kurtis raised his head, staring up at the one addressing him before slowly getting to his feet, standing tall and proud even as Anubis' head bowed in respect. The storm increased in intensity and the waters of the river at Kurtis' feet began to bubble, quietly at first but gradually gaining. Kurtis broke the spell over them as he turned and sprinted towards the nearest floored soldier, stopping them as they moved to rise with a hefty punch to their head. Grabbing their semi-automatic and pistol, he leapt back to his feet and fired a bullet between their eyes before strafing away and opening fire on the others, Anubis forgotten as the battle returned.

Regaining her senses, Lara landed a spinning kick on the soldier that had taken her weapons, following it up with a punch to their cheek as they reeled and then another kick to their stomach, leaping onto them as they fell and retrieving her pistols before following Kurtis' lead and killing them instantly. She got back to her feet, skipping backwards towards Trent as she continued to fire on any and all.

Hillary, close by, darted forwards through the gunfire and grabbed the weapons from the soldier's body, taking one for himself and throwing the other to Bryce, who caught it and began an assault on those nearest to him as he raced for cover.

A scream rang out and Lara looked over, expecting to find Maria as the first casualty of their side, but the girl was rapidly firing on anything that moved as she continued to scream in a blind panic and then Lara realised why. Lying to Maria's side was Fishman, unmoving and his jacket rapidly darkening as blood began to seep from his chest. Ceasing fire, Lara braved the onslaught as she ran to him, dropping to her knees and feeling for a pulse as her other hand tore open his clothing, but Fishman was dead and there was no hope. The bullet had taken a direct path to his heart.

Lara's gaze slid to Kurtis, who caught it and immediately understood her meaning.

"Bryce! Hillary!" he cried out over the noise, "Get her out of here! Run!"

Lara leapt forwards and grabbed Maria's hand, pulling her across the battlefield as they sprinted for Hillary. She shoved Maria to him, Hillary catching her as she fell. "Go!" Lara ordered. "Now!" Her voice carried to Bryce and, crouching low, he ran to them, grabbing Maria's hand as Hillary took her other and then they made their escape under the safety of Lara's cover fire.

They were drastically outnumbered and Anubis was only standing still, his head still bowed, impassive to the actions of the humans below him.

Kurtis' protection was apparently no longer working, as his cry attracted Lara's attention and she looked over, horrified, to find him fallen to one knee, a hand clutching his side and his face etched in pain.

"Kurtis!" All thoughts of covering him as he made his way over to escape with her left her mind and she raced across the bank once again to his side. "Are you alright!" she called out, and then she was at his side and dropped to her knees, still firing in an effort to keep them both alive.

Another figure began to tear across the battlefield from out of the bushes, attracting Kurtis' attention. "Sunderland!" he realised. "Lara! Stop him!"

Lara dived for Sunderland's legs, tackling him to the ground and wrestling against him for supremacy, the two rolling on the ground in a storm of arms and legs and punches and kicks. "Kurtis!" she cried out, "We've got to get out of here!"

Kurtis was gone. She gasped as she realised he wasn't where she'd left him but then her eyes found him again. Their efforts having reduced the number of enemies enough for Harding to risk escape amidst the bullets, he was running over the grass towards the road with Trent hard on his heels. Distracted from her fight with Sunderland, she stopped and stared as Kurtis dove on Harding and brought him hard to the ground, ignoring the gunfire raining down on them. For one horrible moment she thought he didn't stand a chance, but then she realised that not all the soldiers were concentrating their efforts on him and when one dropped from a bullet apparently fired by no-one it dawned on her that Bryce and Hillary must still be around and providing cover for them from somewhere safe in the bushes.

A little laugh of relief escaped her and then a fist connected with her jaw and her attention was quickly brought back to Sunderland.

"Kurtis!" she cried out again, getting pushed onto her back as Sunderland managed to gain the upper hand, "We've got to get out of here!" He didn't listen, just engaged himself in his own wrestling match and Lara groaned as she was punched in the stomach. Subdued by the hit, Lara could only lie breathless for a moment as Travis got to his feet and made for the water's edge, the river now bubbling and boiling ferociously.

"Kurtis!" Lara screamed again, crawling to her knees.

He could hear her shouting for him to escape with her, but Kurtis took no notice. He had something to do first. "You tortured me!" he spat at Harding, clawing at his face as Harding sought to tighten his hands around Kurtis' neck. Vincent didn't answer, just snarled angrily and then cried out as Kurtis' fingernail scratched hard over his eyelid. The pain and his sense of self preservation brought his hands away from Trent's throat and clutched to his own face, and Kurtis took the chance to return the gesture and wrap his hand around Harding's throat, squeezing to quieten him and pressing down hard to hold him still.

The other hand went to his belt and took hold of the knife. As he raised it above his victim, he revelled for a moment in the look of fear in Vincent's eyes. "Kurtis!" Lara screamed to him again. "He's not worth it!"

"I owe you," Trent breathed with venom, and then he sank the blade deep into Harding's chest. The man screamed in pain and fear, and Kurtis allowed himself a small sadistic smile before jumping to his feet and racing for Lara.

Travis had reached the edge of the bank and now fell to the floor, laughing to himself in relief and mania. Reaching out, he made to cup some of the torrid waters in his palms and drink, but a weight landed on top of him and his face was shoved hard into the mud.

"You wanna drink?" Kurtis' malicious voice sounded from above him. Kurtis scrambled from off of Travis' back and a hand pulled him up by his hair as another helped the way with his arm. "Be my guest!" Kurtis shoved him, hard, and Sunderland fell forward, howling, into the waters. The strong current swept him towards the sea, his arms flailing as he fought against the waters.

The gunfire still rained down on them and Lara and Kurtis stood on the bank, ducked under the onslaught and firing back in a vain effort to stay alive.

"We'll never make it!" Lara yelled.

"Do you trust me?" Trent shouted back.

"Of course!"

"Then jump!" Kurtis took her hand and pulled her with him as he turned and leapt into the bubbling waters. Holding onto each other for dear life, they too were swept away towards the mouth of the river, tossing, turning, spinning and spluttering. They disappeared beneath the waves of the sea and the waters settled themselves as Anubis faded from view, the storm dissipating with him and the calm waters where his body previously stood acting as if they had never been displaced in the first place.

Staring in shock from their hiding place in the bushes, Bryce and Hillary with a sobbing Maria stopped firing. With no more attack against them, the remaining mercenaries, still led by Anna, lowered their own weapons, and silence descended on the still and moonlit riverbank.

Hillary swallowed, and then spoke, reciting the passage he had found in the library. "He was swept deep, taken down into the underworld, and the warrior was seen no more."

Bryce could only let out a shuddering breath.


	9. Beyond The Grave

**Ok, I went easy on you this week, there's no nasty cliffhanger. ;-) There's something Bryce says here that won't make much sense if you haven't read my other stories, but it's really not important, so don't worry. Gosh, an awful lot of reviews for the last chapter, the most I've ever had for one. I must have done something right. :-) Thanks everyone!**

**NFI - Here's your answer!**

**SilverDragon - Why, thankyou! hugs> Please try not to asphyxiate on me. ;-)**

**Lara-is-my-role-model - Hey, thanks a lot:-) You do write well y'know, I've read your stuff! I think mytactic is the use of far too many commas and sentences that go on for decades - accidental, but it seems to keep things moving. I love Kurtis. sigh>**

**Odd Little Turtle - Hi! Not often I hear from you. :-) I wondered if anyone would notice that reference. LOL Anyone who's played Silent Hill has probably noticed a ton of others, too.**

**harshlightofday - Hello again! I had fun writing Bad Kurtis, I really did. Fishman - probably coming back.**

**Lady Lara Croft - Wow, what a compliment! I'm glad you enjoyed it!**

**Godavari - giggle> LOVED your chapter 8 review - you're so easy to provoke! friendly grin> I always liked maths, y'know, but I guess each to their own. ;-)**

**Jordana Trent - Hello there. Not heard from you before, I don't think. Glad you're enjoying it and that the research I'm doing seems to be worth it. Fishman will probably be back, I think. I liked him.  
**

_Beyond The Grave_

It was dark.

If it hadn't been for the ground beneath her feet, Lara might have fallen into panicked hysteria from the shock of awaking to sheer sensory deprivation. It wasn't warm, nor was it cold. There was no smell. No sound whatsoever reached her ears. It was so black that when she waved her hand in front of her face she could detect no movement nor tell where her limb really was. Aside from the feel of her toes scrunching against the insides of her boots and the soles of feet pressing hard against the lining, it was as if she were just a consciousness floating, bodiless.

She cried out in shock as something brushed lightly against her forearm, her heart lurching. A presence close to her left, completely undetected until now. Lara wasn't used to having people creep up on her. The contact identified itself as a hand searching for hers, and she gave a moan of relief.

"Kurtis."

"Hi." He whispered, the silent blackness around them hushing him.

"Where are we?"

"We're dead."

A quiet, shuddering, prolonged breath was drawn into Lara's lungs. "You said I could trust you," she said quietly.

"Don't worry – we won't stay this way."

"Do you mind telling me what's going on?"

"We're in the underworld." Kurtis' clothing rustled as he moved and then an ethereal orange glow evanesced into view, illuminating them and their immediate surroundings, fading away into the blackness further out.

"Alright, now I _know_ you've been learning new tricks whilst you've been away."

Kurtis turned and grinned at Lara in response. "The disappearing bullet thing was cool, yeah?" Lara couldn't help but laugh, looking down to hide her mirth. "Come on." He tugged her hand and led her forward, the light remaining centred on them as they trudged their way up a slight but crumbling rocky slope, rubble clattering downwards as their steps disturbed it. Everything was dark and shades of grey or black, like volcanic rock.

"I thought that there was supposed to be a white light and all our dead relatives waiting for us," Lara said dryly.

"This isn't Heaven, y'know. Well, ok, it kind of is. Hard to explain. Different aspects of the same place, that kind of thing. We're experiencing it from the point of view of a believer in Hades."

"Even though Anubis let us in?"

"It was Hades you were expecting to find, wasn't it?"

"What, so you're saying that this is all just in my head?"

"It's like…" Kurtis stopped and thought, letting go of her hand and flexing his fingers in frustration as he tried to find the words to explain it. "All the different afterlives that are described by different beliefs all exist in the same place at the same time and which one you can see depends on what you believe, which one you were expecting to end up in when you died. For all I know I could be standing in the flames of Hell right now, or having a dead Muslim walk right through me."

Lara looked a tad incredulous. "So they're alternate realities rather than different perceptions of the same place?"

A pained look crossed Kurtis' face. "Can we save this for _after_ I've got my philosophy degree, please?" He turned and continued on, leaving Lara huffing in annoyance for a moment before hurrying to catch up with him.

"Why are you here, anyway?" Trent asked conversationally. "You don't have a terminal illness you're trying to cure, do you?"

Lara smiled. "Fishman and I were trying to get to Hades to find the helmet of invisibility."

"Fishman?"

"Another tombraider." Lara stopped, suddenly feeling mournful. "The one who was killed."

At her tone of voice, Kurtishalted and turned back. "I'm sorry," he offered.

Lara sighed and thrust her shoulders back before marching forwards, composing herself. "It's alright. Danger's a very real aspect of the job, he knew that, and it's not like we were close friends or anything."

Kurtis watched her go for a moment and then strode to catch up with her. "Maybe we'll find him, huh?"

The slope levelled off and continued forwards for a few metres before they suddenly found themselves at the edge of a river, the waters trickling along quietly, clear and cold, offering an unobstructed view to the rocky riverbed below. A slight creaking nearby attracted them along the bank until their light fell upon a sagging wooden pier with an ancient rowboat moored and gently bobbing on the waves.

"The River Acheron," Lara realised. "There's supposed to be someone here to ferry us across."

"Mm, Charon," Kurtis said, naming the missing boatman. "I guess he left with the others."

"Where exactly did the other gods go?" Lara asked, turning to Kurtis.

He shrugged. "I don't know. People lost faith in them, they just…left." Trent stepped gingerly onto the rotting pier and then awkwardly braved the boat, sitting down when it didn't sink under his weight. Lara wobbled as she boarded the boat after him and then settled her weight evenly before Kurtis grabbed the oars and began to row them slowly to the other bank, shrouded in darkness. "Once on the other side we'll be able to go through the gate that Cerberus is supposed to guard, except he'll be gone too. From there, you'd originally get judged and then sent to either Tartarus or the Elysian Fields. Hades' throne room is somewhere between, that's probably where your helmet is."

"How do you know all this?" she asked.

"I learnt it in the Order."

"I had no idea." Lara sounded impressed, but Kurtis only quirked a sardonic smile.

"Nor did I. Someone jogged my memory whilst Sunderland had me prisoner."

"Who?"

Kurtis only smiled in reply. "I'm not sure."

* * *

Bryce sighed and sat down on the bed next to where Hillary was lying, staring up at the hotel room ceiling. "I think it's time for us to go home." 

"Not yet." Hillary sounded weary, drained.

"We haven't heard anything from Lara in a week. I can't find any trace of her, or Kurtis, or the mercenary group, or this Sunderland bloke. She jumped into the River Styx and down into the underworld and the only trace they ever found of the warrior that did that in that account you found was his drowned body. Maybe there's a way back, maybe it just takes time and she's trying, but maybe that crazy bastard finally wanted out and took her with him."

"Kurtis wouldn't do that."

Bryce stamped his feet on the floor and stood, marching over to the window. "He tried to kill her because she'd lost confidence! He kidnapped her and tried to trade her life for an end to his own screwed up guilt trip! Why the hell wouldn't he!"

Hillary sat up, trying to reason with Bryce's worry-clogged mind. "If Lara didn't think there was a way back out then she wouldn't have even come here looking for the helmet."

"Yeah, well we didn't exactly put a lot of thought into that part, did we? She always just _assumes_ that if she can get in then she can get out. It's _my fault – _" he kicked a chair – "that I told her about it before I'd even checked there was an exit."

"The mythological warriors who took the helmet found a way back to the living."

"Yeah, that was before Hades locked up and buggered off, wasn't it?"

Silence fell on the room, Bryce staring out of the window across the town and Hillary looking at him sadly.

"It's not safe for us to stay here," Bryce said quietly. "The mercenaries took their own dead away but we had to hide Fishman and Sunderland's man and sooner or later someone is going to find them. We're going to have a murder inquiry on our hands, I think it's best if we leave the country first. Besides, someone needs to tell Fishman's family he's dead and we need to get Maria home."

"You think she's truly dead, don't you?"

Bryce sighed and dragged a hand down over his face. "Truthfully – maybe I want to go home so I can start to forget."

Hillary was silent, letting it sink in, and then he swung his legs off the bed and made for Lara's room. "I'll start packing Lara's things. We can keep looking for a way to get her back from Croft Manor." He left and the door clicked shut behind him. Bryce continued to stare out of the window, a shuddering breath escaping as he fought back tears of guilt at his own willingness to give up so soon. Damn, but it was that Trent's fault. If he wasn't so crazy then maybe Bryce wouldn't find it so easy to believe that he'd drag Lara down into an underworld with no escape.

He jumped as the phone rang, staring at it for a moment before running over to answer it.

"Hello?"

"Bryce!" He fell back onto the bed, his legs unable to support him. Oh god, but it was Lara. "Bryce! Wh – id you – ve me? -y did y- le – Bry – save – e!" Her voice was crackling, syllables obscured by static, like someone trying to speak over a mobile phone with no signal.

"Lara!" he cried back, but there was only static in reply and then the line went dead. Slamming the phone back into the cradle, he raced out of the room, leaving the door banging back against the wall behind him. "Hillary!"

* * *

Lara nimbly hopped out of the rowboat and onto the land on the other side as Kurtis held the oars against the flow he had created to slow the boat until it gently bumped against the shore. The ground beneath her feet was still the same grey crumbling rock, the same blackness pervading everything. A massive wall stood just to the edge of their light, strong and foreboding with only a huge decorative crystalline gate for passage, glinting dully. 

"The adamantine gateway," Lara breathed as she blindly held a hand out for Kurtis, steadying him as he climbed out of the rocking boat. Together they walked slowly forwards. Long scratches were gouged into the rock in sets of four, angling towards each other and crossing over between their groups and parallel within.

"Cerberus was one damn big dog, huh?" Kurtis quipped, regarding the claw marks.

"I'm glad he's gone," Lara mused.

Pushing hard, they opened the gates wide enough for them to slip through, the massive bars sliding slowly back behind them before clanging shut audibly. They walked forwards, gazing round at their environment. To the left of them the ground fell away in a sheer cliff that curved away, rivers of lava breaking out of the rock faces in random places and sliding thickly down towards a stark floor of granite far below, covered in rubble and rivulets of molten rock, areas of burning providing meagre illumination.

"Tartarus," said Kurtis, leaning over the edge and staring down. "Probably don't wanna go there." Lara only swallowed and pulled him away, unnerved by his proximity to the edge.

Carrying on again, the ground they walked began to swell upwards into a hill, grass fighting its way through the cracked rock in small clumps to begin with before building up to a full luscious lawn towards the top. Trees that began towards the bottom of the hill as dead stumps and skeletons of bark became living, thriving beings with full green leaves and huge, healthy roots.

"We're heading for the Elysian Fields," Lara guessed.

"Yep," Kurtis confirmed. "The Greek heaven is right over this hilltop."

Unable to wait, Lara slid an excited gaze over to Kurtis before breaking into a run and dashing for the top, but she never expected what she saw, and she came to a halt, staring out over the scenery before her.

The sky was dark and stormy, thick clouds billowing out and covering the entire area. Reflecting off them were the red lights of fires lit on the ground below, creating shadows and red hues that made the very sky look as if it was burning. Roughly constructed huts of wood, reeds and mud were dotted around in some kind of village, but there was far from a communal atmosphere. If there was anyone there, they were all inside, and the mud tracks that served for streets were littered with bodies, rubbish and debris. A gallows took the village square, a decaying body with white stringy hair and barely recognisable clothes still swinging from its noose.

Not nearly so eager to see what he knew was not there, Kurtis slowly walked to her side. "After the gods left there was no-one to keep this place in order. No-one to keep the sun shining and the happiness reigning in the Elysian Fields, no-one to keep the wicked and sinful locked inside Tartarus – the dead were abandoned. The damned escaped from Tartarus and invaded the Elysian Fields, the blessed were overrun by people murdering and stealing and pillaging and doing all the things that the good were incapable of, and the whole of Hades became one big, dark, eternal hell. That's why it's so dark here – this place just isn't open for business anymore."

"Oh, Kurtis," groaned Lara.

"There's one other thing I should tell you. Time here, it isn't the same as up there. Sometimes it's faster, sometimes it's slower – it's weird. Bryce and Hillary could still be at the riverbank wondering where we just disappeared to, or they could have been waiting for us months and given up on ever seeing us alive again."

Lara tore her gaze away from the village. "Oh," she said. "Well then I suppose we'd better find the Helmet and hurry back, hadn't we?"

"We should find Sunderland, too. He isn't supposed to be here."

"You're the one who pushed him in the river, Kurtis."

Trent shook his hand, eyes screwed shut in annoyance. "I know, I know, I was angry – but he's not supposed to be here. I'm a Lux Veritatis, the last of the breed entrusted with the key to this place, I shouldn't be throwing people in here."

Lara nodded, composing herself ready for another impossible adventure. "Well," she said, "we have lots to do, we should get moving."


	10. Hands On A Windowpane

**Thankfully, the writer's block went away. In this chapter, the italics signify Hillary's dream (apart from when they're being the chapter title, of course).**

**SilverDragon - Thankyou again for your loyal feedbacking! **

**Lara-is-my-rolemodel - Glad to have made you laugh! I think this chapter has a moment that will make you giggle, too. Let me know when you start your new fic, I want to read it!**

**Odd Little Turtle - Why, thankyou! I like all this philosophical cultural belief business, it's interesting. You have to try Silent Hill, they're amazing!**

**Godavari - That phone call is turning out to be a bit of mystery, though it looks as though Kurtis may have figured it out. You'll have to wait and see, though. ;-)**

**Linzi - Thankyou! It's nice to know my writing can affect you like that.**

**AKKON - Welcome! Join the fun! I like the word 'wow' and I like it even more when it's directed at me and repeated three times! LOL I've always liked Bryce and Hillary's double act, I try to play it up.**

**Mystique1515 - Come and join the fun! Thankyou for your review.**

_Hands On a Window Pane_

Hillary yawned deeply, suddenly overcome with tiredness as he picked up an armful of cosmetics from the bathroom counter in Lara's room. Feeling too miserable about Lara's disappearance to fight it, he dropped the cosmetics into the suitcase and then lay down on the bed, planning to rest his eyes and wallow in sadness for a moment.

_He found himself surrounded by a thick white mist, choking the air around him and floating past in streaks of thin and thick, obscuring his vision and leaving him feeling confined in an area that could have just as easily been a tiny room as miles of open fields._

_He walked blindly forwards, moving slowly and never seeing more than three feet in front of him. _

_A flash of movement ahead of him made him halt abruptly, frightened by the sudden and unidentifiable source. Standing still and watching closely, the mist thinned out and he began to distinguish the silhouette of a person, arms and ponytail arcing out as they swung left and then right, as though searching for something around them._

"_Hillary!"_

_Lara? Was that her? "Lara!" He called her name and darted forwards, but though it should have taken him only a few steps to reach her, she was always standing just a few feet away._

"_Hillary?" She spun towards the sound of his voice and he could just make out her profile turning towards him. "Hillary!"_

"_Lara!" He continued to run, but still failed to draw any closer. Disheartened, he came to a thudding stop and stared at the shadow still only a short distance away. _

"_Hillary!" She was turning around again, still searching for him. "Hillary, why did you leave me? Why didn't you save me?" Her voice was imploring, her actions desperate. "Hillary, save me please, don't leave me this time! Hillary?"_

"_Hillary!" It wasn't Lara's voice that time – it was Bryce's._

Hillary awoke with a start, finding himself on the bed and Bryce standing in the open doorway with his hand still on the door handle. "Hillary, wake up," he demanded. "It's Lara."

"I know." Hillary struggled to sit up, rubbing his eyes to wake himself fully.

"You know?"

"Just now – I must have fallen asleep. I dreamed about her." The butler looked to the technician, worry evident on his face. "She was lost in fog, calling out for me. She begged me to save her."

Confusion flitted across Bryce's features. "I just got a phone call from her. It was static-y and echo-y, like a bad line. I couldn't make out what she was saying mostly, but she definitely said, 'save', and she definitely sounded frightened."

"Oh Lara." Hillary drew his knees to his chest and buried his face in his hands. "What are we going to do?"

"Get Maria," Bryce said, quiet determination in his voice. "Find out from her if Fishman knew anything we don't. And find a way to get Lara back." He turned, sweeping out down the hallway towards Maria's room.

* * *

Back down the hill and through a hallway of rock, everywhere dark save for the light of Kurtis' spell, the two adventurers found themselves in a huge, cavernous room, the furnishings and limitations of which lay outside the illumination of their light.

An unlit torch sat in an iron bracket on the wall behind them, and Lara patted her legs, feeling for something within one of the many pockets of her camouflage trousers. Finding it, she fished out a cigarette lighter and took down the torch, setting it alight and walking cautiously forwards along the wall, searching for others like it.

They began to appear from out of the darkness, and she held the torch to each one in turn, illuminating the room slowly with a flickering orange glow.

"You smoke now, Lara?" Kurtis asked humorously.

She quirked a smile. "Remarkably useful, cigarette lighters. And one of the few thingsthat wasn'tthrowndown onto the bank. My backpack is just about empty, I think."

A few moments of silence passed as she finished lighting the room, and then she turned to see what it was her work had revealed. A silent gasp escaped her.

An ornate throne of onyx and stone stood to one end, massive in proportions so that as Kurtis stood next to it, running his hands over it admiringly, the top of his head didn't even reach the seat. Running along the centre of the room was a long, ornate wooden table, laid out with the remains of a magnificent banquet. Plates were missing, the food had either rotted or been eaten, goblets lay fallen with their long-since dried contents now staining the wood beneath them and the candles that had been set at regular intervals had burnt down completely, leaving only trails of wax down the spiralling candlesticks. Opposite to the throne, on the other end of the table, a small wall of stone bricks was built up in front of the rock wall of the cavern, curving outwards to create a semi-circular area that was filled with water, still and calm.

"It looks like somebody pillaged the meal," she said, walking towards the table and reaching out to touch the massive tableware, finding it to be pewter or something similar. "Do you suppose it was the Shades?"

"Shades?" Kurtis turned, interrupted from his wondering examination of the throne. "Oh, that's what the Greeks called the souls of the dead, wasn't it? Yeah, probably."

"But they're dead. Surely they don't need to eat?"

Kurtis strolled over, poking the remains of the meal as he went. "How long has it been since you ate? Are you hungry?"

"A little, yes," Lara replied, rather taken aback by the apparently unrelated question.

"You're dead," Kurtis said matter-of-factly. "You don't need to eat. But, you've spent your whole life needing to eat to stay alive. You've spent your whole life needing to breath to stay alive. You don't need to do either anymore, but if I held you under that water over there you'd probably still think you were drowning. I'm guessing that's why we saw dead bodies in the Elysian Fields. The Shades think they can kill, they think they can die."

He continued on, moving to the pool where he trailed his fingertips lightly over the surface. "This is nice."

Lara looked over, a thought suddenly occurring to her. She hurried to his side, staring down into the waters. "Some legends say that the gods had a pool of water which they could use to see other realms." She swished her fingers through the water, frothing it up as though she could make an image appear. "Do you know how it works?"

Kurtis shrugged. "Don't look at me, I thought this was just décor."

"Ah, so you're not a fount of all death-knowledge, then."

"To be honest, I did spend a lot of time in class at the Order day-dreaming about the girl who lived over the street."

"Oh yes?" Lara said deprecatingly, not at all surprised by that admission.

"Yeah," Kurtis sighed, smiling dreamily into space. "Jennifer…my bedroom looked directly into hers. I used to sit on my window-seat with my fingers on the glass, watching her dance to Simple Minds on the radio. My first love…I was twelve, she was eighteen…," he laughed to himself, coming back down to earth. "I don't think she even knew I existed. 1984…damn good year."

"Pathetic," Lara giggled, and she raised her wet hand from out of the water and flicked several droplets at his face. He laughed in response and then sat on the wall, looking down at the now-rippling pool.

His sudden calm rubbed off on Lara, and she found herself staring deep into the depths, completely unaware of anything around her. Bryce and Hillary found their way into her thoughts, and before her eyes the waters began to ripple from an unseen disturbance, their clear blue-tinged surfaces taking on colour in form as Lara and Kurtis' reflections were lost in a picture of Bryce, Hillary and Maria.

The butler was lying on her hotel bed, hands clasped at his chest, eyes closed. Bryce sat at the bedside, laptop open, and Maria was dropping pills into a glass of water and dissolving them with a furious mix from a biro.

"The Ancient Greeks believed that the dead could talk to the living through dreams," Maria said, her voice quiet and sad. "Drink these sleeping pills, close your eyes and think of Lara in the fog." She handed the glass to Hillary, who downed the mixture. "Ask her what we should do."

Several minutes passed, Lara and Kurtis staring intently into the waters at the rippling image before them. Hillary's eyes began to flutter, signalling dream-state, and Bryce sat forward intently.

"Lara…" Hillary breathed, and Bryce tapped on his keyboard, apparently having the good sense to transcribe the experiment.

The butler twitched slightly, rolling his head and muttering something incomprehensible.

"Hillary," Bryce whispered harshly. He opened his mouth again to say something else but Maria pushed him back into his seat, silencing him.

"Shh," she scolded, "do you want to wake him up?"

The butler continued to fidget, apparently dreaming intensely, and then with a gasp his eyes flew open and he sat bolt upright, breathing heavily.

"What?" Bryce demanded. "What did she say?"

"We have to go to the river," Hillary answered. "Take the comm. sets. She'll try to talk to us, like she did to you over the phone."

"Was…Gareth there?" Maria asked, tentatively.

Hillary looked up, apologetic. He shook his head. "I'm sorry, Maria."

Back in Hades' throne room, Lara was shouting at the floating image. "Hillary! Bryce! Hillary! Listen to me!" It was no use and she thumped her palm against the wall in frustration. She looked away from the pool and the image faded, her reflection returning to show her looking at Kurtis in confusion.

"That wasn't me talking to them. Hillary must have really dreamt it."

Kurtis turned away, hiding his face, thinking but not wishing to be seen. "Maybe," he said.

Lara considered asking what he meant, but thought the better of it and instead turned back to the pool.

"Fishman," she whispered, closing her eyes and focusing her thoughts. Once again her reflection morphed into somebody else's, and when she opened her eyes, she saw him. "Kurtis," she barked, "look."

He spun back, looking down into the waters. "Damn," he whispered.

Fishman was with Sunderland, the two hurtling through the slum-like village in the Elysian Fields with a mob of bedraggled, barbaric souls chasing close behind, brandishing sticks and swords and bows and arrows, some dead soldiers still in their armour, others just civilians with a streak of black in their hearts.

Sunderland looked much the same as he had when Kurtis had thrown him into the river, his face a picture of terror. Fishman, however, had clearly been a victim of the strange time alteration that Kurtis had said affected the underworld. Though he had been killed only minutes before Lara had jumped into the river, it looked as if he had been dead a good while longer than they had.

His clothes were ragged, his hair longer and tangled, his skin dirty and his previously fit and muscled frame now thinner and more lithe, as though life had been lacking in food but full of fight and flight. He had Sunderland's wrist in his hand, pulling the terrified man after him as they flew through the streets. Fishman's eyes were darting left and right, looking for an escape. He pulled Travis around a corner with him and then dived into a small alleyway created by the proximity of two shacks, the area no more than a rubbish dump. They scrambled through the rotting food and dirt and lay flat, out of sight as their pursuers rounded the corner and continued straight on.

"Thankyou," Sunderland panted.

"Oh shut up," Gareth Fishman spat. "You're the reason I'm here in the first place, remember? I only saved you because no-one deserves to be caught by those barbarians. Now shut the fuck up, keep your Rolex watches and gold jewellery out of sight before anyone else tries to mug you, and follow me."

Lara shook her head, willing the image in the pool away.

"How long has he been down here?" she wondered, a tone of distaste in her voice.

Trent turned, marching for the doorway. "Come on," he called over his shoulder. "We have to take Sunderland back with us and we can't leave Fishman down here. Not in this place."

* * *

It was nearing sunset as Hillary eased the Jeep Wrangler to a halt on the riverbank of the Dnister. Throwing open the doors and dropping the soft-top, they set up their equipment. Maria booted up her and Bryce's computers as Hillary unpacked the communication headsets Lara always used to keep in touch during her raids and Bryce set up the electronics he'd hastily designed to try and boost the range of the radio signal.

The trio arranged themselves across seats with limbs and wires hanging out of the vehicle as necessary in order to achieve some sort of workstation, and then, taking a deep breath, tried to contact the dead.

"Lara?" Bryce said into his headset. "Lara, can you hear us?"

The radio only crackled in reply, no signal being received.

"I'm not picking anything up," Maria said, scanning for radio signals on her laptop.

Bryce tried again, almost demanding an answer. "Lara! Lara!"

The radio crackled again, but then a snippet of a voice broke through on Bryce's headset and the external speaker, tinny and distorted by the electronics.

"—yce—"

"Lara!" Bryce started tapping away feverishly on his computer, trying to cut the noise on the signal. "Hillary, grab that antennae, move around, try to get a better reception."

Hillary did as he was told, and another snatch of speech broke through again. "Br-yce!"

"I've got it," Maria shouted, fingers flying over her keyboard. "There's no signal as such coming through, she's not using a radio – in essence we shouldn't be picking anything up at all…but from the variation of the noise on the signal as Hillary's moving around, I've triangulated the best place to pick her up, she must be directly under there. Hillary, go about two feet to your left. Good, now hold the antennae as high as you can."

It seemed to work, the static quietened and this time when a voice came through, it was possible to make out the whole sentence. "Bryce, are you there?"

"Lara!" Bryce almost jumped in joy, Hillary gasped and grinned in delight. "Lara, are you ok?"

"Bryce, they need your help. Go to the ruins of Tyras, to the tomb of the Lux Veritatis."

"They?" Bryce asked, confused. "Who's they? What about you? Where are you?"

"The tomb, Bryce. Hurry."

"Lara!" Bryce shouted again, but suddenly the static tripled in volume, drawing a cry of pain from him as he tore the earpiece from his ear.

All three looked to each other, taken aback by Lara's words.

"I think she's gone," Maria said quietly. "Maybe in more ways than one."


	11. Exhumation

**Well, I finally managed to log in! This chapter's been waiting since Saturday. **

**NFI - Why, thankyou! Took me ages to come up with that chapter title. Thought I'd get all arty and mysterious. ;-)**

**Mystique - Ooooh, not just 'fantastic' but 'fan-freakin-tastic'! Thanks for reading!**

**Odd Little Turtle - Thanks for reviewing again! It _could_ be time dilation. Then again, it may not. ;-)**

**SilverDragon - LOL! I have to say, that particular image was not one that popped into my head...until you suggested it, of course. Gosh, that would be funny!**

**Linzi - Dead? Me? What, I miss _one_ week, and I'm dead? LOL! ;-) Don't worry, all will soon be revealed, as there actually isn't that much more to come.**

**Lady Lara Croft - Hello again! Thanks for your double review! As for what or who Hillary and Bryce are hearing - well, you'll have to wait and see. Good luck with exams and the move!**

**Deeply Darkly - Wow, what a lovely, well-rounded review! Thankyou so much and welcome to the story! You and a few others have suggested the different time scales for Bryce and Hillary's contact, and all I can say is - not telling! ;-) Let's hope you do get converted to the wonderful world of TR ficdom!**

_Exhumation _

"_You think she's gone?"_ Bryce repeated Maria's words back to her, disbelievingly. They were still sat in the Jeep on the banks of the Dnister, still reeling from Lara's rather disturbing words. "What do you mean, 'you think she's gone'? Are you insane? She just spoke to us."

Maria shied away from his anger slightly, leaning backwards as he thrust an accusing finger at her.

"Don't you dare think we're giving up," Bryce spat.

"Bryce, calm down," Hillary ordered. He sighed, trudging back to the Jeep and flopping down into the backseat. "You have to admit, Lara did say 'they' needed our help, and there was no mention of her, even when we asked."

"Oh, not you as well!" Bryce slammed his laptop shut and breathed heavily, dropping his elbows onto the computer and his head into his hands. "Dammit," he whispered fiercely. His hand slapped the antennae that Hillary had placed down, sending it toppling over. "Damn that Trent."

"We should go to Tyras," Maria said. "It's the ruins of a Greek city, I think. It's somewhere around here, Gareth told me."

"I found a research article on it in the library," said Hillary. "Did you scan the whole thing, Bryce, or do we need to go back and get it?"

"I just scanned the bit about the tomb," Bryce muttered. "We'll have to go back. Maybe the Tourist Information, or whatever it is this country has, will be able to tell us something about it. Might be open to the public or something."

"Alright then," Hillary said, getting out and going around to the driver's side. "Let's go to this 'Tyras' place, then. Maybe Lara will contact us again there."

* * *

Lara and Kurtis stood at the top of the hill looking down onto the Elysian Fields. The fires still burned, the streets were still deserted and the rumbling thunder of a brewing storm rolled overhead. 

"Any ideas about how we're going to find Fishman and Sunderland?" Kurtis asked.

"Look for modern shoe sole prints in the mud, go into a hut and ask around…I don't know, we'll find them."

"Well, at least we're armed," Kurtis muttered, fingering the gun at his side stolen from the mercenary he'd killed. The light of his Lux Veritatis spell evanesced into darkness at his silent command and, under cover of the dim cloak over the forgotten underworld, they slipped and slid down the steep hill to the village of the Shades.

Tiptoeing quietly through the streets, their eyes darted everywhere for any signs of movement and their fingers flexed readily at their holsters.

Kurtis started as beside him Lara drew her weapon and spun, aiming behind her in one fluid movement so fast that anyone trying to sneak up on them wouldn't have had a chance. As far as he could tell, though, there _wasn't_ anyone trying to sneak up on them.

"What's the matter?" he asked, casting an intent glance across the empty street behind them. "I didn't hear anything."

"I did."

Lara, gun still held out in front of her, stalked forwards, turned sideways slightly for maximum readiness to move.

"What?"

"I don't know," she answered, suspicion tingeing her voice, "but there was definitely something. Don't you feel we're being watched?"

"Oh we're being watched," Kurtis answered. "People have been watching us through their drapes from their huts since we got here. The moment you look over they hide."

"No, it's something else," Lara disagreed, shaking her head. "It feels more like we're being hunted." Slowly, she lowered her gun and turned back the way they were going, continuing on. "Stay alert," she ordered.

"Oookay," Kurtis replied, drawing his gun and casting a final glance back before following.

They hadn't gone more than two streets when the crack of a twig broke the silence behind them. Instinctively, they both spun back round with their weapons aimed, finding nothing there. Neither lowered their weapons, now sure that Lara had been right.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Kurtis asked, his voice low.

Lara quirked a sarcastic smile. "That we haven't found that Helmet of Invisibility yet?"

"Exactly."

"I'm really hoping they only speak Ancient Greek when I say, 'let's split up'," Lara suggested. "There must be only one of them, and hopefully they'll follow me and attack, thinking I'm the weaker target."

"You're saying _I'm_ a weak target?" Kurtis complained.

"Sorry," Lara answered with a grin.

"Ok, you lead 'em off, I'll keep looking for Fishman and Sunderland. Yell if you need anything."

"Don't worry, I'll be sure to scream helplessly." They both holstered their guns and walked off calmly, as if convinced that they'd imagined the whole threat.

As Kurtis continued in their original direction, Lara headed for the square, for an open arena where she had room to move. Reaching it, she stood in the centre and took out her weapon again, pretending to become engrossed in poking and prodding at it, comfortably assuming that an Ancient Greek wouldn't understand what the contraption was. Her show of distraction worked, as only a second later something swept against Lara's ankles, knocking her feet out from underneath her and leaving her falling painfully onto her back, arms bent by her head, as the gun fell from her hands and flew through the air, landing some distance away.

No follow-up came, and Lara got back to her feet, brushing herself off and looking around for any sign of movement. There was none, and then a heavy thump landed against her side, drawing a groan from her as she fell sideways, catching her fall with her arm. She stood once again and looked around. As she'd expected, this called for some exotic training she hadn't used in quite a while.

Dropping her head and closing her eyes, she let out a long, slow breath through pursed lips and arced her hands out, up and downwards into a prayer stance. Eyes remaining closed, her chin raised as she quickly became focused, and she felt the prickle of someone watching her in the centre of her back.

The tiniest, normally imperceptible movement sounded to her left, and instinctively she swung her left arm out to the side as she spun, flattening her right hand and ramming it forwards towards her target, her palm connecting solidly with an invisible form. The attacker stumbled back, and Lara stilled, eyes darting left and right as she waited for the next signal.

Another rustle warned of a charge towards her, and so she quickly moved into a sideways kick, her foot hitting hard against someone's chest and gaining a cry as they stumbled and fell. A cloud of dust was thrown to the air as a thump signalled the assailant hitting the ground and Croft pounced, fumbling her way by touch to sit astride them and take hold of the helmet she knew they wore.

Her fingers found curved metal where the head should be, and so she took hold and pulled, the helmet and the soldier beneath her springing into view as the two were parted.

Multiple footsteps thudded against the dirt of the courtyard as Lara threw the helmet irreverently over her shoulder, freeing her hands to take a firm hold around the soldier's neck.

Kurtis, Sunderland and Fishman skidded to a halt at her side, breathing heavily from their run and watching in silent wonder as Lara barked something in Greek at the man beneath her. Clearly terrified, he nodded. Flexing her fingers to increase her grasp, Lara gritted her teeth and then jerked her hands, breaking her prisoner's neck and leaving him instantly dead.

"Well," she said to nobody in particular, "obviously Kurtis is right about them believing they can die again." She got to her feet, dusted herself off, bent to pick up the abandoned helmet and straightened, offering a questioning look to the men at her side in reply to their own expressions of bemusement. "He said he'd escaped from Tartarus," she said, pointing to the doubly dead soldier lying awkwardly behind her. "Hardly a worthy member of society."

There was stunnedsilence.

"I found them," Kurtis offered, gesturing to Fishman and Sunderland.

"So I see." Lara smiled. "Shall we be getting back?" She turned, helmet in hand, and sauntered off in the direction of the hill, scooping up her gun as she went.

"And there's us running half way across town to save her," Fishman muttered, giving Sunderland a shove in Lara's direction for good measure. Kurtis grunted in agreement.

"So you're taking me back?" Sunderland asked excitedly as he, Lara, Kurtis and Gareth strolled back through the village.

"Yes, we're taking you back, Travis," Kurtis sighed.

"Oh thankyou. Thankyou, thankyou, thankyou for not leaving me down here. I mean, you'd really be well within your rights to but – "

"The only reason I'm not leaving you down here," Kurtis said, shouting him down, "is because I wouldn't be doing my job if I did. So shut up and keep walking."

Travis, keen to stay as in favour as possible, had the grace to look sheepish. "Right."

Lara smirked.

"How long have you been down here?" Kurtis asked, directing his question to Gareth.

"By my watch, about three months."

"Sorry we didn't come sooner," Kurtis said. "Weird time dilation stuff going on, y'know."

"Yeah, I know." A few moments of quiet passed and then Fishman returned, intrigued, "How long have _you_ been down here?"

"A few hours maybe," Lara answered. She raised her arm to check the time and saw there the wristwatch received only a few days before, for her birthday. Suddenly reminding her of its givers, she said quietly, "I wonder how Bryce and Hillary are managing?"

"I'm sure they'll be fine," Trent said reassuringly. "We'll be back soon, anyway."

"Which could be months for them."

"They'll be ok, don't worry." Kurtis reached out and grasped her hand, giving it a squeeze, and left it there as the four walked on.

* * *

Thankfully, Hillary, Bryce and Maria had managed to reach the library before its late evening closing. They'd dashed in, found the article about the archaeological excavations of Tyras, scanned it into Bryce's computer, snatched a tourism leaflet about the ruins from the front desk and dashed back out again, a full five minutes to spare until closing. 

According to the literature, Tyras had been built on numerous times over the centuries, and was currently home to a fortress from the 1500s that still stood complete, staring out over the estuary of the Dnister. Open to the public, the fortress was also a site of archaeological excavation spanning several metres of history, with a focus on the Greek and Roman settlements.

"It's closed," Hillary pointed out from his vantage point in the Jeep in the fortress visitor car park that late evening.

"You can't very well rescue your friends from the underworld whilst there are tourists milling around, can you?" Bryce replied.

"Are you saying that we break in?"

"Of course. What else are we going to do?"

"We're already risking murder enquiries, I'm not sure I want to pad my criminal curriculum vitae out with burglary," Hillary protested.

"It's not burglary, it's breaking and entering." Bryce jumped out of the car, taking his share of the equipment with him. "Come on," he said to Hillary as Maria proceeded to unload her own things, "chop, chop."

Hillary sighed, getting out of the car and reluctantly taking the radio equipment. "You _are_ irresponsible, Bryce," he complained.

Huddling in the shadows against the massive doorway to the fortress, Maria examined the electronic lock.

"Think you can manage it?" Bryce asked, hoping she'd say no.

"A child could manage it," she threw back disparagingly. Bending down, she opened her laptop case, turned on her computer, and rummaged around in one of the side pockets. Pulling out a lead, she plugged one end into her USB port and then held the other end in her teeth as she took a pen-knife from her trouser pocket and used it to lever off the cover from the lock. A multiple-pin socket revealed itself from amongst the wiring and she took the lead from her teeth and plugged it in.

Detecting the connection, a program on her computer booted up, a window containing a six figure number of green digits that immediately began to cycle through thousands upon thousands of combinations. Seconds passed, the computer processing at an impressive rate, and then it beeped, the correct code flashing up on the screen. Simultaneously the fortress door clicked and Maria, grinning triumphantly at Bryce, pulled down the handle and opened the door.

"After you," she said sweetly, unplugging the lead from the lock and then standing with it with her hand bent to her shoulder, an infuriating accessory to her ungraciously victorious smile. Bryce sneered and went inside.

The fortress inside was incredibly dark and Hillary, having the presence of mind to bring a torch, took it out and flicked it on. The beam arced around until it fell on an information board on the wall, detailing a map of the fortress and the excavations. "The pit should be straight ahead," he said quietly. "According to the article the tomb is in the deeper regions of the excavation, right out underneath the river. It's not viewable by the public."

"Underneath the river?" Bryce asked.

"Literally metres of earth can build up over something as old as an Ancient Greek settlement, and rivers always change their course over time. It would have been on the surface originally but just got buried and then the river moved over the top of it," Maria explained with what Bryce felt was a note of condescension. As if wanting the last word in an argument, she quickened her pace and hurried off towards the dig site in the courtyard.

"Brat," Bryce complained. Hillary laughed.

The two men entered the courtyard and were met by a huge marquis-covered trench deep into the ground with railed boardwalks suspended above it for tourists and archaeologists alike. Moving forwards, they stood on the edge of the pit and looked down. Layers of history were visible before them; hundreds of years, hundreds of generations, thousands of people, millions of days of everyday life now nothing more than silent, impassive layers of rock. Mediaeval, Mongolian, Roman, Greek – the constructions of dead societies buried deep in graves now exhumed for the benefit of human knowledge.

"Wow," Bryce breathed.

"I hope I'm not open to the public when I'm dead," Hillary said, and then he handed the torch to Bryce, climbed underneath a railing and started down a nearby ladder to the trench.

"Over here," Maria hissed. The torch found her hovering at the black hole of a tunnel in the side of the trench. "I think this must lead to the site under the river, where the tomb is."

Bryce hopped lightly down the ladder and followed Hillary carefully across the dig, both of them educated by Lara in the etiquette of walking in an archaeological trench. Hillary poked his head inside the hole and then pulled it back out and took the torch back off Bryce. Shining it in, he fumbled around for a moment and there was a clunk, a whir, and the tunnel lit up as lights fixed along the tunnel roof were lit by a portable generator hidden in the tunnel mouth. The butler flicked the torch off and then crawled inside. "Come on," he called back to the others, "Lara said we had to hurry."


	12. Facing Destiny

**Ok, here we are, another chapter, and on time this week too! Thanks for your reviews, everyone. As ever, they are muchly appreciated.**

**Ms Croft I Presume - Welcome! Welcome! And thankyou! 'And now I'm going to be climbing the walls until you update', your review said as it dropped into my inbox at the exact moment I uploaded the next chapter. LOL - Didn't have long to wait, did you!**

**Lara is my rolemodel - Hey, I love your smileys! In my defense, I couldn't log in to upload for, like, three days.**

**theharshlightofday - Thanks, that's the kind of imagery I was going for exactly. Yay, it obviously worked. Don't worry, Iplan to keep writing andPartners In Crime has only just begun. :-) I'm sending hugs your way just for sticking with my work!**

**Odd Little Turtle - Yeah, I noticed that 'thing' between Maria and Bryce, too.It's not like I planned it, the darn characters just keep running off on their own!**

**Mystique1515 - Thanks! There will be more of Partners In Crime, as soon as Ican write something that I'm satisfied with. I'm having trouble getting Kurtis' fling with his neighbour right.**

**Akkon - Thanks, andyou're welcome! Glad you appreciate my sense of humour!**

**SilverDragon -Actually, you're right, Kurtis is being a bit too nice to Sunderland, isn't he? I think he sees him more as an annoyance thananything - Harding was the focus of his rage - but he should probably be a bit angrier. I'll see what I cando about that.**

_Facing Destiny_

A creak sounded and Lara and her companions, nearing the edge of the village, halted, Lara and Kurtis drawing their guns as Fishman revealed a knife from his belt and Sunderland simply stopped, gasping and looking around in fright.

The creak continued, a drawn out sound, and then Sunderland's eyes fell on the source of the noise and he pointed. A wooden hut door some way up ahead had swung slowly open. No cause for the movement could be seen, no-one stepped into the street.

"What's going on?" Kurtis asked.

"Wait, just wait a second," replied Gareth.

A moment later a slow, quiet figure emerged, coming to stand in the middle of the street and staring at them, expressionless. At last he spoke.

"You are leaving, Mr Fishman?"

Lara turned to Gareth, surprised. He was standing calmly, his weapon lowered, apparently acquainted with the man and knowing him to be no threat.

"I'm not supposed to be here," Gareth said.

"You're needed here."

Fishman shook his head. "I'm sorry." Not taking his eyes off the man, he turned his head slightly towards his friends on his left and offered them an explanation. "Guys, this is Minos. I guess you'd call him the village elder. He's the longest-dead of the few original inhabitants of the Elysian Fields still left, from before those from Tartarus took over."

"You speak English?" Lara asked Minos, confused.

"Languages are constraints the living place upon themselves, like so many other constraints that hold you back. The enlightened dead see and know so much more. She's shown you that already."

"Who?" Lara demanded, her eyes narrowing in a growing suspicion.

Minos just smiled. "There are so few of us left to offer protection against those who would attack," he said, turning back to Fishman. "So few soldiers lived out their lives without falling to Ares and so being consigned to Tarturus, and without his blessing all but three of those who came to these Fields have had their souls destroyed in the wars in this place. Most of the rest of us surviving came here either too old or too young to fight, we need you, Mr Fishman."

"I'm not supposed to be here," Gareth repeated.

"But who told you that?"

"She did. And you know She's right. You can't have me stay here to look after you, Minos, you know it's not my fight."

"Our souls _will_ die."

"There's no such thing as eternity."

Minos blinked, considering Fishman's argument. At last, he sighed and conceded defeat. "Goodbye, Mr Fishman. Thankyou for helping us." He turned and disappeared back into his hut, the door creaking slowly shut behind him.

Gareth let out a long breath, his eyes closing in regret. "Ok," he said, composing himself, "it's time for us to go."

Somewhat taken aback and obviously not going to receive an explanation from Gareth, Lara looked to Kurtis to see his reaction, but he too was only showing calm acceptance as he started off to follow Fishman.

* * *

The tunnel from the dig trench started out as modern and man-made, but soon intersected with another at an angle of different construction. Whether it was man-made and just very much older or natural, Hillary couldn't tell. To the left, sloping up towards the surface, the original entrance tunnel was blocked by a rock fall, explaining why the archaeologists had created their own entrance and why the tomb had presumably lain undiscovered for centuries. Hillary followed the tunnel down to the right, getting deeper with every foot.

"Oh," he breathed, as he emerged into the underground cavern at the end of the tunnel. Straightening up and moving forwards to allow Bryce and Maria to exit behind him, he took in the sight around him.

The cavern was small, only twelve feet or so across, and the low roof left little room above his head. The walls and ceiling were wet, droplets of water from the river above permeating through. The floor ended about four feet before the far wall, an underground tributary of the Dnister taking up the space in the floor's absence. It flowed slowly along, quiet trickling filling the cave. A safety rail had been set up along its edge by the archaeologists and a safety report on planned diving lay on a tool box nearby, the papers stained by water droplets.

The dominating presence of the cavern, however, was the tomb of which Lara had spoken. The paper Hillary had found in the library had stated that the tomb contained a body unknown by the townspeople but epitaphed by someone who cared, and the appearance certainly did agree with that. It was a high rectangular stone coffin without the usual engravings that usually graced Greek architecture, as though no-one had been involved with the body enough to produce anything more substantial. Carved roughly into the lid, however, unskilled and hastily done, was the Greek script that the paper had translated.

"And Anubis appeared from the depths of the seas, as tall as the mountains westward and as black as the waters in the storms he brought. He looked upon the bank where the warrior knelt. 'For I am your servant; your voice rouses me from my slumber. Arise, messenger of my lord. The Gates are open.' And the warrior stood, forcing Anubis to his knees, and the waters bubbled as boiling. He was swept deep, taken down into the underworld, and the warrior was seen no more," Bryce recited, supplying the words to Hillary's unspoken thoughts with expert timing as he read from the paper he'd pulled out of his pocket. "Well," Bryce continued, "we were not wrong about this guy opening the gateway to Hades, were we?"

"Something doesn't add up, though," Maria said, moving to the tomb and staring in at the empty interior through the open triangle created by the skewed position of the lid, left half removed. "This is a coffin. Therefore, there must have been a body. There's nothing in here now, sure, but they've probably just taken the skeleton away for testing." She turned to Bryce and Hillary, questioning them with her look. "So where are Lara and Kurtis' bodies? And Sunderland's?"

Neither of the men answered, unwilling to consider Maria's clinical assessment. A body would make Lara's predicament far too similar to the unknown warrior's.

"Hil – y - - Bryce!"

All three jumped as the words, broken by static, rang out without warning, echoing around the cave.

"Over there," Maria said, pointing to something behind Bryce, "the archaeologists' radio."

Bryce turned, quickly finding the communication unit used to talk to those up in the main dig site, where it was set up in a corner.

The radio sprang to life again. "Can - - hear me?"

"Lara?" Bryce called, pressing the Call button as he did so. "Is that you?"

"In the - - er. They're in - - river. Dive. - - t the- p."

"Lara, say it again, we can't hear you."

"Th--- bodi-s. Can't com- --ck with the bod--- in- -- river. Dro-wn."

Any further communication was cut off as a crack of a small explosion sounded, the speaker grille lighting up as sparks flew inside and the smell of burning slowly filling the air.

Bryce eyed Hillary and Maria with a slight expression of worry. "Did she just say that their bodies were in the river?"

Maria clapped her hands, suddenly piecing together what it was Lara had been trying to say to them. "Yes! You're right! And if they come back whilst their bodies are in the river, well, they're going to drown aren't they? We have to recover the bodies."

Hillary's hand moved to cover his mouth thoughtfully. "She said, 'they'."

"What?" asked Maria, neither her nor Bryce catching his words.

"Nothing. Nothing, it's ok." Hillary waved his hand dismissively.

Bryce stood up. "Looks like we'll have to go swimming."

"I'll go," Maria volunteered, already taking off her boots and socks. "You stay, fix the radio in case she needs to talk to us again."

"Are you sure?" Bryce asked. "Me and Hillary, we've seen dead bodies before, if you don't want to…"

"No, it's ok." Maria dug a transparent plastic pot filled with liquid out of her jacket pocket that she'd thrown it to the floor, and took the lid off. Proceeding to remove contact lenses from her eyes, she continued, "Hopefully Gareth will be down there. Besides, I'm no good with electronics, I wouldn't know what to do with the radio." She put the lenses in the pot and screwed the lid back on.

"You wear contacts?" Bryce asked, surprised.

"Yeah, I'm blind without them. Should be ok to see down there though. I ruined my eyes with too many computers when I was a kid. Don't you wear them? You use computers a lot too."

"No, my sight's 20-20."

"Hmm." Maria shrugged, moving to the edge of the river and gasping as she lowered herself into the freezing depths. "Ok," she said, "hopefully I can do this by holding my breath otherwise we're going to have to go and find diving equipment. Wish me luck." With that, she gulped in a lungful of air and disappeared under the surface.

"Did you hear that?" Bryce laughed, turning to Hillary, not noticing the man's suddenly quiet demeanour. "She doesn't know how to fix a radio and she's half-blind! Great!"

* * *

Maria dived deep, eyes straining as she looked around. The bodies had to be lodged somewhere otherwise they'd have come to the surface, and some sort of current must have brought them from the sea… She searched, looking for overhangs of rock and feeling for currents. Just as she thought she was going to have to surface for air, her hand feeling along a rock surface suddenly slipped, moving into a pocket of water hidden up behind a bank of the tributary.

Pulling herself past the overhang and into the pocket, she felt blindly around in the dark silt-y water dreading what her fingers might catch onto. Her nails scraped against flesh and the movement dislodged the hideous treasure. Dead, open eyes loomed into view as the pale, wan face of Kurtis floated up in front of her, lips blue and pupils dilated. The corpse stared at her accusingly and Maria panicked, fingers connecting with spongy flesh as she shoved it away and lurched backwards in the water. Terror taking over as her back hit against rock and she realised she wasn't sure where the exit was, all control over her rapidly diminishing oxygen vanished and she found herself drowning, limbs kicking frantically as she desperately sought her escape out of the pocket.

A body floated down in front of her again, the eyes of its female face closed, the long dark braid weightlessly trailing around it. Maria tried to scream but only brought water into her lungs as suddenly the body's eyelids snapped open, the brown eyes behind staring but alive. Frantic from the fear of the living dead around her and the torture of her burning lungs and pounding head, Maria twisted and turned in the water, but the brown eyes appeared before her again, blinking humanly. The body's strong fingers took hold of Maria's shoulders, raising her panic levels even more, but instead of attacking the hands pushed Maria downwards, turning her over so that she was upside down and guiding her forwards until patches of light coalesced into the path back into the main river. She was pushed forwards, back out of the pocket, and then more fingers closed around her wrist and pulled her forcefully up, bringing her up alongside somebody else who then pushed her past themselves, propelling her upwards.

She broke the surface, gasping in desperate air and splashing violently with her arms in an attempt to gain equilibrium as the lungfuls of oxygen slowly relieved the panicked feeling of necessity. A second splash beside her signalled one of her saviours surfacing a moment later, and she looked over to see Hillary taking in his own much-needed breaths, though his were nowhere near as long overdue as hers.

"Are you two alright?" Bryce was saying, reaching forwards to take Maria's hand and pulling her over to the land. "You were down there ages, Maria, we got worried." He pulled her out of the water and then reached forwards to help Hillary too, leaving Maria to fall into a heap and continue breathing heavily, her forehead resting against the cold stone, her eyes closed in relief.

"Hey. Hey, are you ok?" Bryce asked, shaking her shoulders. Wearily, she nodded.

"Where were you?" Hillary asked. "I couldn't see you, then the next thing I know you're down at the bottom in a complete panic."

"I found them," Maria said, not managing more than a whisper. "They're in a pocket underneath us. They looked…oh god, they looked horrible. I couldn't breathe – Lara, she came alive, she helped me back out into the river."

"Lara's back?" Hillary cried, he and Bryce darting to the edge of the water to stare into its depths. "Where? I didn't see her."

"She didn't follow," Maria groaned.

"They might need help," Bryce said quickly, rushing back to Maria and taking hold of her shoulder as he checked she was ok. "You stay here," he said, checking her pupils weren't too dilated and making sure she was breathing well. "We'll go and find her." He disappeared again, he and Hillary leaping into the water.

Seconds that seemed like hours passed, and then they both splashed back to the surface, arms moving across the surface as they trod water. "We found the pocket," Hillary said, swallowing. "We should be able to get them out."

They each took another deep breath and then dived again. Recovered somewhat, Maria crawled to the edge of the river and waited, squinting down into the depths, ready to help anybody that surfaced. She saw something rising slowly, a large, dark shadow. It surfaced with a small splash, bobbing lightly in place. Lara's body. Her eyes caught another movement, another shadow rising, and then Kurtis broke the surface of the water, Sunderland following straight after. Splashing up between them, Hillary and Bryce appeared, coughing from the lack of air. They looked around for a moment, orientating themselves, and then Bryce sent Kurtis skimming over the water towards Maria as Hillary pushed Lara over before sending Sunderland following.

Wincing slightly, Maria pulled the bodies out onto the land, helped by Bryce and Hillary from below.

"Gareth?" she asked. "Where's Gareth? He must be down there."

"Sorry, Maria," Bryce said, shaking his head as he climbed out. "Hillary took his torch down there, there was no-one else."

Taken aback, Maria simply sat and stared.

"Lara," Bryce said, voice croaking from being unused to swimming underwater. "Lara, are you back?" He crawled over and brushed the wet strands of hair from her face, Hillary joining him. "Lara?"

Deciding his help would be more useful elsewhere, Hillary moved to Kurtis and started the same process on him, pulling open an eyelid, slapping him lightly, attempting CPR, simultaneously checking Sunderland.

Neither man found any signs of recent life.

Bryce sighed, dropping his head and closing his eyes.

"They're dead," Hillary whispered.

"If she really had come back – " Bryce began, close to tears, but Maria spoke up, cutting him off.

"I must have imagined it," she lied. "I was panicking, it was dark – I think I imagined it. I probably just…bumped into her. I don't think they've come back yet, there's probably still a chance."

Bryce looked up, knowing exactly what she was doing. He smiled. "I'm sorry about Fishman."

Maria nodded, trying a smile as she bent her head to hide the tears that were about to fall.

"We'll keep trying. To get them all back," Hillary said, bravely tenacious as he moved to sit next to Maria.

"'Course we will," Bryce agreed. He sat down on the other side of Maria and pulled her into a hug. "We'll get them all back."


	13. Buried

**Ah ha! We're back with an update! I'm sorry this is so long overdue, but I did two updates for Partners In Crime and this chapter required a major rewrite thanks to something Akkon said - which is no bad thing at all, it's made the chapter far more interesting! Thanks as ever for all the reviews.**

**Mystique1515 - Why thankyou!**

Linzi - The dead bodies were kind of icky, weren't they?

Ms Croft, I Presume - Well, I'm not that good at updating, as I've just managed to proove! We readers don't hate you at all, we just intensely dislike having to wait so long for updates to such a great story as Salvation! LOL Just kidding, but please get Chapter 13 up soon!

Odd Little Turtle - Thanks for that! I totally didn't realise that they'd be all decayed until you said so! Had to use a quick get out clause for that one.

Godavari - Thanks again! Make the most of your summer!

Akkon - As I already said, you're responsible for a major part of this chapter, because until you said I didn't remember that Minos was the name of the King who had the Minotaur. D'oh! I actually named the character after the brother of a Greek friend, and intended him to not be seen again, but that's all changed now, thanks to you. And I'm glad you enjoyed No Man's Land - I got your review for that, thankyou very much. Bryce is rather lovable, isn't he? Please try not to get sacked!

SilverDragon- The mysterious second Lara strikes again. Hee Hee. And there's a nice bit of revenge for Kurtis here, just for you.

Lara-is-my-role-model - Hmmm...a Maria/Bryce romance? Maybe...would you like one?

_Buried_

As they left the village of the Elysian Fields, Kurtis conjured up the light once more, surrounding himself, Lara, Travis and Gareth as they walked back through the Underworld towards the adamantine entrance gates.

Gathered loosely together, their weapons holstered, the Helmet of Invisibility tucked safely under Lara's arm, the raiders and the demon hunter chatted amiably, pointedly excluding Travis who was becoming increasingly annoying with his attempts to befriend his saviours before they changed their minds about leaving him. Kurtis was making very sure not to so much as look in his direction, anger towards him simmering quietly below the surface.

Approaching the gates, it became steadily darker as they left the meagre illumination of the lavas of Tartarus and the fires of the Elysian Fields until it was once more pitch dark, the inky blackness falling in on them oppressively against their thin shield of magical light.

Their boots crunched over the shale and rock towards the River Acheron once again, the rowing boat mysteriously tied up at the dock on the other side again, where Lara and Kurtis had found it but not where they'd left it.

"So assuming you _do_ make it past Cerberus to escape the Underworld, you still have to be able to swim," Lara quipped.

"Who's Cerberus?" Travis asked.

"Shut up, you imbecile," Fishman said irritatedly. "Y'know, I'm really beginning to wish I hadn't saved you."

"What have I done!" Travis complained.

"Would you like an example or the full list?" Kurtis countered. "Shut it."

"Maybe we could drown him. Right here," Lara suggested.

Travis looked at her, shocked and frightened. "I'll be quiet. Please. I promise, I'll be quiet. Not another word out of me. I'll be as silent as the grave, you won't even notice me, I sw-"

"Shut up!" Kurtis bellowed. Sighing, he turned back towards the river and the shadowy form of the boat on the other side. He raised his hand, palm outwards, and the mooring line flicked, untying itself instantly. He then turned his hand, beckoning the boat, and it quietly but quickly slid across the water towards them, smoothly turning to float stationery in front of them parallel to the bank.

"Oh, you think you're so impressive," Lara chided light-heartedly.

"I _know_ I'm so impressive," Kurtis grinned. He climbed in, the boat rocking as it took his weight, and sat at the end. Gareth clambered in next, leaving Lara to take the oars as he muttered something about not having eaten properly in weeks. Lara just smirked.

"What about me?" Sunderland asked, eyeing the full boat. "You're not going to leave me, are you?"

"No," Kurtis said shortly, and then he thrust his palm towards Sunderland and then immediately made a sweeping motion with his arm across the river, his telekinesis throwing Sunderland clean across the water. The man screamed, and Kurtis pulled his hand back sharply at the last moment, the action abruptly slowing Travis' body enough for him to hit the bank without too much injury. He landed with a painful-sounding thud and then skidded noisily a few feet over the loose rocks, a cry of dull pain escaping him.

Lara raised an eyebrow.

Sunderland was still lying there when they hopped out of the boat at the pier, clutching his arm and groaning quietly. "I could have swum," he moaned.

"Well it wouldn't be very nice of us to let you get all wet, now, would it?" Kurtis smiled acidly.

Lara grabbed hold of him and pulled him to his feet, shoving him forwards ahead of them as they began walking into the blackness from which they arrived.

"So how do we get back out?" she asked Kurtis.

"Not long after the gods left and the Styx became the Dnister, a Lux Veritatis gave his life to guard the doorway. He was the best there was at contacting the dead, the strongest at magic. He was the only one who could open the doorway from the other side to let people back into the world of the living. He volunteered to come down here and stay, so that anybody who managed to open the gateway in the future would be able to go back. He'll send us back to the Earth plane."

Lara's brow furrowed in thought. "That's his tomb buried at Tyras, isn't it? Unmarked apart from a rough inscription, archaeologists have said it was a drowning victim."

"That's him," Trent smiled. "The real reason behind his death needed to be kept secret to protect the Order and the doorway, but they couldn't let him go without thanks so a couple of warriors were sent to chisel the inscription in the middle of the night."

Lara smiled, quieted by the sentimental gesture. "That's nice," she said.

Continuing to walk forwards through the darkness, shallow water splashed underfoot as Travis stumbled into a stream that was no more than a trickle.

"This is it," Kurtis said as the other three drew up behind Travis and stepped into the stream themselves. "The doorway should bring us out close to the tomb. It's sort of a focal point for his magic in the living world."

"What's his name?" Fishman asked, intrigued. Kurtis sighed, his eyes dropped to the ground.

"I don't remember," he answered quietly, a little guilty. "A great man like that and I can't remember his name."

"Ok," he said, composing himself. "Let's do this."

He got to his knees, the slight water wetting his pants legs, and folded his hands in his lap. His head tipped back, his eyes closed, and he began to chant, the words breathy and quiet but recognisable to Lara and Fishman as Latin.

"Erm," Sunderland whispered to Fishman, "do you hear something?" Fishman glared, a silent demand to shut up and let Trent concentrate. "No, really," Sunderland persisted, looking nervous. "I can hear something…like hooves. It's coming from over there."

"Shut up," Lara hissed.

An orange glow separate to the one still hanging in the air around them from Kurtis' spell began to grow, sourcing from a point in front of the Lux Veritatis warrior and growing outwards in a vertical plane, living tendrils of light unfurling and snaking around, contrasting sharply against the blackness behind them. The three observers jumped back in surprise as, between Trent and the wisps of light, a ball of fire suddenly burst into existence, the size of a melon and floating in mid air. Burning in place for a moment, flames licking over its surface, it attracted their attention as something mystical and seductively dangerous before it exploded, huge flames leaping out in all directions whilst Kurtis, fallen into some sort of trance, ignored the danger completely. As fast as the inferno had grown, it imploded, flames dragged back in again by some gravitational force particular to them alone, and then it dropped out of existence, leaving a man standing before them.

Frozen in place by wonder, Lara, Travis and Gareth regarded him. Long black curls fell around his face that was marred by the scar of what had once been a long, deep cut across his cheek. Highly decorated metal gauntlets ran up to his elbows, the protection continued above the joint by long strips of leather wound around his upper arm. The hilt of a massive sword protruded above his shoulder, apparently held in some sort of back brace that manifested itself across his chest as crossed leather straps over a deep red length of cloth wound around his torso as some sort of makeshift, sleeveless shirt. His black trousers were slightly baggy, allowing movement whilst not being a hindrance, tucked into calf high boots inlaid with metal. Apparently, the ancient Lux Veritatis had been the much more traditional warrior.

He looked to them. "You wish to return?"

"Y – yes," Lara stammered.

"She told me you would be coming." The warrior looked to Kurtis, assessing him, and Lara was about to ask what he meant, but he spoke. "He is weak," he commented. "It is all he can do to conjure me. He is like a child. I will not be able to hold the doorway open for long with such a poor warrior to draw from."

Lara's consternation at the insult made her forget her fear before the commanding presence. "He is an excellent warrior!" she protested.

The Lux Veritatis smiled, warmth clearly showing in his eyes. "Forgive me. He is the last. Without the strength of other warriors to draw upon from his mind, he does the best he can. I commend him."

He strode over to the orange light, floating patiently, its tendrils wafting softly as though in water. Drawing his sword, he took hold of it with both hands before drawing it back, ready to plunge it into the centre of the glow.

"Wait!" Lara cried. "What's your name?"

He looked to her, slightly surprised. "James," he said. "James of Cottam." Waiting no longer, he drew the sword back once more and then thrust it into the light. Immediately, shards of blinding white light shot out from the impact point, reaching a point before shrinking back inwards again with equal speed. They returned back to their source at the tip of the sword, and then, a sound like thunder tearing through the air, the orange glow ripped open in all directions, a jagged floating window left in its place that framed a perfect white. It fought against the sword in its centre, the warrior visibly struggling to hold the weapon in as an invisible force pushed it back out like a repelling magnet.

With a cry, Kurtis was released from his trance, falling forwards onto his hands and panting heavily.

"Kurtis!" Lara cried, rushing over to him. "The door's open! Come on!" Fishman and Sunderland darted forwards towards the doorway, but a sound from behind them caused them to slow their steps as horror crept over their faces. Turning slowly, they both gasped.

"Lara," Fishman began. "Run."

* * *

Bryce, Hillary and Maria were still sitting despondently yet slightly hopeful in the cavern underneath the Dnister housing the Tomb of the Forgotten Warrior. The water of the underground tributary lapped at the land beside it and the bodies of their dead comrades lay silent at their feet, still wet, their eyes glassy.

Without warning a low rumbling took up in the cavern, shaking the ground underneath their feet and rattling the radio that had earlier been their line of communication to Lara.

"What the hell?" Maria cried, jumping up.

"Earthquake!" Hillary shouted over the noise. "Get back to the surface, quickly!"

They began to run towards the entrance tunnel, Maria getting there first and falling to her knees to crawl in, but they were interrupted by a sudden bright flashing behind them, strobing around the cavern in white light and shadows. Startled, they turned to find short sparks of lightening arcing out from a point above the Tomb, leaping out in all directions forward of the source but never behind it.

Unable to speak, they backed up against the wall and shielded their eyes against the light, bracing themselves against the uncontrollable shaking of the ground.

Above the crackling and the roar, the radio sparked into life, the familiar voice coming out of it this time loud and clear, no longer hindered by static.

"It's the gateway!" Lara's voice shouted to them. "It's going to collapse! You have to hold it open for them!"

"Lara?" Bryce yelled. "Hold it open how? What's happening? Where are you?"

In a blaze of white light, the lightening suddenly arced out further and more fiercely, and then it had ceased, a tear in space-time in its place, wide and gaping, showing nothing more than pure, blinding white inside.

"The sword in the Tomb!" Lara screamed over the radio, desperate to be heard above the din. "Push it into the gateway!" Thinking quickly, Hillary ran to the huge stone tomb and wrapped his fingers around the partially open lid, pushing hard. It was heavy, and it was hard to put strength into moving it whilst shying away from the rippling white window above, but with Bryce and Maria helping it eventually slid across the tomb, the low scraping of stone on stone almost inaudible over the continuous rumbling of the cavern. Inside was indeed a sword, lying in the shadow, tagged with an archaeology label, the skeleton of its owner long since removed for tests. Hillary snatched it up, nearly dropping it from the surprising weight, and dropped it onto the floor with a clang. Together, they heaved the coffin lid back across and then Bryce jumped on top, taking the sword from Hillary and, groaning from the weight, holding it to the gateway. The gateway resisted, pushing back, but Bryce called for help and Hillary and Maria clambered atop to join him, wrapping their hands over his and lending their strength. Slowly, their muscles shaking from the exertion, they inched the sword forwards until the tip pierced the white gateway, but no sooner had it broken the surface then it shoved back with an almighty force, the sword falling from their grip, the three adventurers falling to the floor.

* * *

Lara and Kurtis barely had time to look up at Fishman's warning before a huge, white horned bull leapt towards them from out of the darkness. Screaming, they each flung themselves to opposite sides, their previous positions occupied only a moment later by the hoofs of the massive beast. The legendary Minotaur.

The event barely registered with the ancient Lux Veritatis warrior, still fighting to keep the doorway open with his sword, but the others were completely consumed by the sudden attack. Sunderland only stood, transfixed in fear, as Trent, Fishman and Croft drew their weapons, the two with guns opening fire. The beast snarled as the bullets rained down upon it, but it did not fall. Instead, snorting, it turned and charged towards Kurtis. He dived out of the way, scraping his arm painfully on the rough rock. Losing its target, the Minotaur stopped, stamping its hooves in place a moment and eyeing the people with black, glittering eyes as it tried to rethink its instinctive strategy.

Bellowing, it charged for Lara. Thinking quickly, she turned and sprinted for the wall behind her, planting one foot upon it as she reached it, the beast dangerously close behind her. Pushing hard against the wall, she rebounded, giving herself extra height and distance as she jumped through the air, placing her hands on the Minotaur's back and using it as some kind of vaulting horse, landing behind him and spinning quickly to open fire, Kurtis' weapon blazing also now that Lara was out of the line of fire.

"Minos!" Fishman screamed. "I know you're here! Call it off! This isn't the way!"

Sunderland suddenly made the connection. "Minos? _King_ Minos! The king from Greek mythology that had the Minotaur in a Labyrinth and fed Athenians to it? _That_ Minos? And you _argued_ with him? Are you insane!"

The bull charged again, moving faster this time, angered by Lara's escape. Their bullets were having no effect, and Fishman didn't dare try and attack it with his only weapon, a small knife.

"Minos!" he called out again, diving to safety as the Minotaur directed its attack on him, "I can't stay, you know that!"

The Minotaur, nostrils flaring, cried out again and ran for Sunderland. Less of an athlete than the others and certainly not as used to facing terror in the form of certain death, Sunderland only stood and screamed. Fishman sprinted towards him, shoving Sunderland to safety as the Minotaur butted its head towards them. The massive curved horns pierced the skin of Fishman's stomach, taking hold enough to pick him up and fling him through the air as the beast tossed its head.

"Fishman!" Lara cried. In desperation, Kurtis threw a telekinetic push at the bull, but it served only to anger the beast more and detract its attention away from Lara as she took the chance to race to Gareth's aid.

The Minotaur charging towards Kurtis in raw vengeance, the target took a moment to glance across to the doorway. The warrior was struggling desperately to keep it open, his face grimacing in exertion as he fought to keep the sword in place. "Sunderland!" Kurtis cried, wanting the man gone if only to avoid the need for another self-sacrificing rescue attempt of the man who probably didn't deserve it, "Get through the doorway! Now!"

* * *

"I….can't!" Maria complained, her strength failing as she, Hillary and Bryce continued to fight to hold the sword in the doorway at their own end. Her muscles eventually gave out and, panting, she fell back onto her heels.

"We've got to!" Bryce got out through gritted teeth, but his own strength was fading, and so was Hillary's, and the push of the window against the sword was gradually beginning to win out.

"Oh my god!" Maria screamed, leaping off the tomb and backing into a corner. A moment later her action was explained as two hands curved over Bryce and Hillary's, a body adding its own substantial strength to their cause. Hillary gasped as his eyes travelled up the wet, pale arms, the horror of the body's identity already in his mind before he saw their face.

It was Lara.

"Lara!" Bryce cried, forgetting to push as he looked up to her, standing over his shoulder. "Lara, it's you! You're back!"

"No," Lara said, her eyes still dead but her voice the same as ever. "I'm not who you think I am. Push. We have to help hold the doorway open for them."

Hillary, Bryce and Maria could only stare at her words, momentarily shocked, but as the sight of Lara's body working so hard against the gateway sank in, they did the only thing they could and helped.

* * *

Sunderland didn't listen. The Minotaur, though charging on Kurtis, was between him and the doorway and he didn't dare cross its path.

"Gareth!" Lara gasped, putting her hand to the wound on his stomach from the Minotaur's horns. "Come on, we'll get out of here, don't worry." She helped him up, hooking an arm around his waist and resting his own over her shoulders, limping them towards the doorway.

At the last possible moment, Kurtis dived to safety. Landing on his side, he directed his free arm towards the ceiling and pulled, using his telekinesis once again. A crumbling, shaking sound echoed from the darkness above and then a rock fall plummeted down, landing squarely on the Minotaur. It howled as the heavy rocks and smaller stones pelted down on its back, its legs bending helplessly underneath the weight.

"Come on!" Kurtis yelled, racing over to Sunderland and grabbing his arm, pulling him over towards the doorway. He threw Sunderland through, the man swallowed up in white light, disappearing completely. Trent then ran to help Fishman and Lara, Fishman coughing uncontrollably and trying to bat away his rescuers.

"No," he croaked, "I'm not coming. Just go, the doorway won't stay open much longer."

"Don't be ridiculous!" Lara scolded.

The sound of rocks and stones falling against each other sounded once more, and, horrified, they looked over to see the Minotaur rising from its grave. Spurred on by the sight, Kurtis and Lara put even more strength in dragging Fishman to the doorway with them, but he was pulling back, protesting between coughs and splutters, the blood seeping out across his clothes.

"I can't go!" he maintained. "I died fairly! It was my time! I can't go back!"

The Minotaur, now fully free of its rocky prison, scraped its front hooves across the ground.

"What?" Lara asked, amazed that he wanted to stay.

"I said I can't go back!" Fishman yanked himself free from them, standing freely but clutching his stomach wound. "I'm not supposed to be _here_ but I'm not supposed to be _there_, either."

The Minotaur snorted and then charged.

"I'm supposed to be in heaven, that's what I've always believed. But I got dragged down here whilst the gateway was open after I was killed."

The Minotaur approached them, thundering across the cavern.

"I stayed long enough to help you, but you have to leave me now. I can get myself out of here, to where I'm supposed to be."

There were only feet left between the Minotaur's horns and its targets.

"Tell Maria…I'm proud of her."

The danger suddenly registered, and all three leapt to safety, the bull missing them by centimetres.

"Lara, leave him, he has to stay," Kurtis shouted to her, taking her hand and running with her to the doorway. "He can get out of here, he'll be ok."

"Hurry!" the warrior from the doorway cried, "I can't hold it!" The sword was wobbling dangerously as the balance between the push of the doorway and the warrior tipped back and forth, neither holding the advantage for long.

Fishman was panting, blood pouring from his wound now. The Minotaur charged, racing towards him as Fishman only stared the beast in the eye.

The doorway was only feet away as Lara and Kurtis sprinted to make it through before the warrior lost the battle and it collapsed, trapping them in the Underworld. A cry sounded behind them and Lara unthinkingly skidded to a halt, gasping in horror as she looked over her shoulder and saw Fishman on the floor, the Minotaur standing above him with his horns buried deep in his victim's shoulders.

"Lara! No!" Kurtis cried, struggling to stop running as she pulled her hand from his, but he couldn't and as she ran towards Fishman, guns blazing, his arm outstretched for balance touched the doorway and he was engulfed in light.

* * *

A deafening bang sounded in the cavern and Bryce, Hillary, Maria and Lara were thrown backwards through the air, the sword pushed out of the doorway as it collapsed, the white tear in the fabric of space knitting back together in a short second of unimaginable force.

"Lara?" It was Kurtis' voice. He and Sunderland was scrambling to their feet, their bodies suddenly and strangely regenerated to look as healthy as they had before, the only signs of their watery grave the wetness that was still dripping off their skin and clothes.

"You're back?" Amazed, Bryce stood up. "Lara's already – " He looked down to Lara's body, but she was lying where she had fallen, still, as pale as before, her eyes still open and staring.

"No. No, No, No," Kurtis complained, resolutely refusing to admit what he knew to be true. "No, the doorway can't have collapsed without her, it can't have." He shook her shoulders, slapped her face, pulled the wet hair away from her face and cupped her cheek. "No. No!"

"Kurtis! What happened?" Hillary demanded. "Where's Lara?"

Kurtis didn't answer, just stared towards the Tomb Of The Forgotten Warrior, sitting silent and passive.


	14. Dark Dawn rewrite

**2/11/05: It's been six months since I updated my current stories. Six months! All I can say is 'sorry' - I lost my muse and couldn't turn out anything anywhere near the standard I had set myself with the previous chapters. However, last night my muse returned from her extended holiday trekking around Africa finding herself (or whereever she got to), and I managed to rewrite the last update of this story, in response to reviews saying that Kurtis' behaviour just didn't fit. So here's a rewritten version that I think works better, complete with original author's notes to chapter 13. The next chapter is already underway and reviews for both incarnations of chapter 14 will be answered there. **

* * *

**Sorry, sorry, sorry for the wait! RL keeps getting in the way, and I've been working on Partners In Crime, as you know. We got a new pond in our garden and got four new fish - named Penn, Teller, Lara and Kurtis! LOL**

**Akkon - You're welcome! That chapter wouldn't have been half as good if you hadn't pointed out my unintentional reference with the name 'Minos'! **

**SilverDragon67 -Thanks! ;-) I think that the dialogue in the final scene of this chapter is a bit weak - what do you think? **

**Linzi - How has it been, living on tenterhooks wondering how Lara is going to get out? evil laugh ;-) How do you feel about still not knowing how she's going to get out? LOL - next chapter you'll find out - I promise!**

**Jordana - Thankyou kindly:-) Good to know my hard work in the action scenes is paying off. You're not the only one to ask for Maria/Bryce, so I think I'll be nice (to you and Bryce! LOL) and throw some in.**

**Well, the age-old question of 'Who the hell is that Weird Dream Lara Chick?' gets some work today...**

_Dark Dawn (#2)_

"Fishman!" Lara tore across the cavern, guns spitting round after round into the Minotaur, but it ignored her. Behind her, Kurtis called her name, begged her to stop, but she couldn't oblige. Fishman's life was already lost, now it was his soul at stake and she couldn't let him die. Not again. Not completely.

"Lara, no!" Fishman cried, but again she ignored the plea. She was only feet away from him now. Her bullets were having no effect on the Minotaur, but if she could punch it, kick it, persuade it away from Gareth…

A bang like a bomb exploding crashed throughout the cavern. Instinctively, Lara ducked, covering her head with her arms, a short scream of surprise and fright escaping her. Awaiting some kind of fallout from the noise, Lara waited, still ducked. None came. Slowly, confused, Lara uncovered her head and looked up, blinking.

Silent darkness.

And then it hit her. The doorway had closed, taking Kurtis with it and leaving her trapped in the underworld with no light and no way out. A small gasp of terror sounded, dreadfully small in the claustrophobic blackness.

Lara started, gasping again, as there was the sound of hot breath being snorted somewhere to her right. It was the Minotaur, as shocked as her at the sudden disappearance of light so completely that it was impossible to pick out even the smallest detail. It snorted, hooves shuffling as it climbed off Fishman and the man groaned as the horns were torn from his shoulders and his battered body was released from underneath the crushing weight of the beast.

Loose shale tapped as the monster hooved the same spot continuously, unnerved. Lara froze, her breathing painfully shallow and light. The slightest sound could persuade the beast to charge in her direction and in the darkness that could all too easily be fatal. The moment was horribly, horribly precarious.

She was stunned as a bright, white light suddenly flared around her. For an instant she was blinded, squeezing her eyelids shut ineffectually against the red burning on her retinas. The shock of the sudden loss of one of her most important senses seemed to shut down her others, and it took a moment to realise that there was the sound of galloping, and it was rapidly approaching her.

At the last possible minute her eyes recovered, and she froze once more in the sudden realisation that the light was centred on her and her alone, and the Minotaur, now seeing its target again, was dangerously close.

She acted on instinct, not even knowing what she'd done until she had dived to the left, crashed to her stomach, rolled over, and opened fire on the irreverent mockery of a bull as it slid to a halt on the loose, broken ground. Her bullets were still having no effect and it was seeming more than just a possibility that the creature wasn't just resistant to her attacks, it was completely immune. The fierce light surrounding her put her at a definite disadvantage – though the Minotaur had clear view of her, she could see very little of it, or indeed anything else. Her eyes just couldn't function properly in the glare, and they certainly couldn't handle the contrasting darkness further out. It was the opposite of leaving a dark cinema and stepping out into broad daylight.

Growling in frustration and fear, Lara flipped back onto her feet and stood her ground. The Minotaur was already robbed of its natural mortality, otherwise it wouldn't be here in Hades. Post-death immortality was attainable, Kurtis had said, if a person could shake the lifelong expectation of eventual death. The Minotaur didn't have that expectation – it wasn't nearly self-conscious enough. Quite simply – Lara didn't believe that there was any way to win the fight.

She stood, shaking her head uselessly, as the beast turned and advanced on her once more. Its thundering hooves echoed throughout the cavern, and as it came closer her crippled eyes began to make out the shadows of its form through the light.

She couldn't fight – it was useless. If she ran blindly, would she escape? Lara was at a loss and she honestly didn't know what to do.

'Remember,' she told herself in her mind as the Minotaur drew closer and closer, its head bowing to bear its sharp, already bloodied horns, 'this will only kill you if you think it's going to. It won't kill you. It won't. It won't. It _won't.' _

She closed her eyes, turned her head away, ready for the agonising pain that was bound to befall her as the Minotaur impaled her, and in the back of her mind a little voice said, 'It will.'

A cry of excruciating pain rang out through the cavern.

* * *

Overcome, Kurtis collapsed. His knees gave out, his mouth fell open and his body flopped to the ground, his eyes still staring almost sightlessly at the silent tomb. That was it. She was dead. The gateway had collapsed and she'd been left behind. Without him she couldn't open it again, and there was no other way back. No other way.

A tightly controlled, angry voice broke through the shocked quiet, challenging him to voice the answer that he'd already silently given. "Where. Is. Lara?" It was Bryce, chest heaving in rage as he glared at Kurtis with a look that would have been painful if Kurtis hadn't been feeling so completely numb. He still didn't answer, just looked back, an apology in his eyes.

"Where is she?" thundered Bryce.

"Gone," Hillary whispered and then, more loudly to Kurtis, "She's gone, isn't she?"

Unable to face them, Kurtis got to his feet and ran.

* * *

Lara's mouth had been open ready to scream, but she'd never had the chance. She opened her eyes, felt something fall at her feet, looked down…

When she managed to speak her voice was shocked, relieved and horrified all at once. "Fishman!"

He'd come out of nowhere, thrown himself between her and the Minotaur – saved her. He was crumpled at her feet, blood pouring from his wounds, panting desperately and holding onto life through sheer, forced belief that he didn't have to die. It was a tenuous link, a thread that was about to break, and with the pain that he was feeling he wasn't sure that he didn't want it to.

The Minotaur took a couple of steps back, lowered its head, prepared to strike again, as many times as necessary to persuade its enemy that the wounds were mortal.

"Stop."

Lara turned towards the voice, the entire cavern suddenly becoming illuminated by source-less light that incorporated her own and diluted it throughout the space, dimming everywhere to a comfortable, paler luminosity. Minos was stood across the cavern.

The Minotaur stopped, snorted, backed off and sloped back to its master. "This is unnecessary," Minos said, watching the two carefully as Fishman lost the strength to sit and collapsed completely, Lara knelt by his side in concern with one eye on their attacker.

"What do you want from us?" Lara demanded.

Minos' expression changed, becoming more calculating as his head cocked to one side and his gaze fixed resolutely on Lara. "You're a strong woman. Impressive warrior."

Lara looked down to where Gareth was breathing hard, his head lying heavily in her hand as her other rested comfortingly on his chest. "Not impressive enough, apparently."

"My people need a champion."

Surprised that this motive hadn't occurred to her before, Lara sighed, her shoulders sagging. "So that's what this is about." Her voice suddenly became harder as a wave of anger washed over her. "Fishman won't stay to protect you so you try to kill him? It's help you or nothing, is it?"

"I do this for the good of my people."

"You do this for the selfish appeasement of your conscience." The accusing voice that spoke was Lara's, but she hadn't said anything. For a moment, her features knotted in confusion and then she realised that Minos wasn't looking at her any longer and she followed his gaze. Astonished at what she saw, she staggered back in her crouched position and fell against the wall.

It was Her again, her double, the other Lara that she had seen in her dream.

"What do you mean?" Minos asked Her, his voice belligerent.

"You know exactly what I mean. I know my mythology. As King you committed sin after sin, and then, when you were trying to kill an innocent man, you were murdered. Instead of being cast into Tartarus where you belonged, though, you found yourself appointed a judge of the dead with the deciding vote for all those that came through the adamantine gates after you." She walked towards him and began to circle, her eyes flashing and her mouth twisted venomously as she continued. "Oh, you were terribly grateful for your narrow escape, weren't you? Decided that you'd do everything you could to deserve it. So you cast the evil down to Tartarus and the good to the Elysian Fields. Then the gods up and leave, letting chaos reign. And you can't stand it, can't stand the guilt that comes with knowing you got off scot-free and the people who deserved an eternity of bliss weren't getting it. So you stayed, took them in your charge, ruled them and protected them as you should have done in life, only you made it all the worse – because as soon as the damned realised that their judge and jury was still around, they came after you. And you, frightened little King, hid. Hid behind your subjects and let them die for you, and then Fishman showed up. Oh, he wasn't supposed to be here, he was supposed to go somewhere that still had order, which wound you up, no end, didn't it? So you decided to try and make him stay – force him to stay in hell with you and at the same protect you and the people you were using as your human shield. Isn't that right?"

"I think you overestimate your importance here," Minos shot back, his voice whispering with barely contained rage.

"Oh, I don't think so. When I was alive I believed in all religions and followed none. I don't belong in any one nether world but I can travel through them all. There's a little bit of every creed in me, and that makes me more powerful than you could possibly imagine."

"You dare to threaten me?"

"_You_ dare to threaten the people under my protection." She shot Minos one last dagger-filled glare and then approached Gareth and Lara, Lara's astonished, terrified gaze contrasting with Gareth's expression of admiration and gratitude.

"Thankyou, for looking after them. Go, now." She smiled and nodded to one side in gesture for Fishman to leave.

"But - Lara," he groaned, "she's trapped here now."

"Lara will be fine," She smiled, extending a hand to him. "Go." Fishman surveyed her for a moment, judging the truth of her words, and then acquiesced. He reached up and took her hand, letting her pull him to his feet, wincing from the movement. "Go," She confirmed, placing a hand on his chest.

"No!" Minos exploded, and as the Minotaur charged again, Gareth turned to Lara and smiled his thanks as he disappeared in a flare of blinding white light.

* * *

"You son of a bitch!" Bryce screamed, tearing off in hot pursuit of Kurtis who had disappeared down the tunnel.

"Bryce! Wait!" Hillary cried, darting after him.

Not quite knowing what else to do, Maria followed. As she emerged from the end of the tunnel back into the main dig site, now bathed in the light of a dawn outside the building that had come too soon, she was just in time to see Bryce dive and tackle Kurtis.

The two men fell to the floor, yelling and hitting and kicking and cursing. "Get the fuck off me, you freak!" Kurtis cried, on the bottom of the struggle and not faring well in his exhaustion.

"You killed her!" Bryce bawled, maintaining the upper hand through punches and strangleholds and sheer unadulterated fury.

Hillary dashed forwards, reaching down and pulling Bryce off his victim, locking his arms around Bryce's shoulders to maintain his hold as he brought him to his feet. Panting, Kurtis lay there, spitting out a mouthful of blood from a split lip.

"I'm sorry," he insisted, getting unsteadily to his feet. "I tried, I really did."

"Why can't she open that doorway again? Why is she trapped there?" Hillary reasoned, still holding back his cohort.

"The same way you need a Lux Veritatis to get you into Hades, you need one to get you out. She can't open it herself." Kurtis shook his head, still breathing heavily, and grimaced in frustration at his inability to find another solution. Sensing that Bryce's initial wrath was spent and now replaced with dull shock, Hillary pushed him away and advanced on Kurtis himself, showing an anger that never usually reached the surface in such vehement quantities. "Get her back," he hissed. "Perform the ritual again and go in and get her back."

Trent backed away, surprised at Hillary's uncharacteristic attack. "I can't. It's too late! Another few minutes and she'll be…" He stared at Hillary imploringly for a moment and then dropped his head as his shoulders sagged.

"What…do you mean?" Hillary whispered, daring Kurtis to even suggest that there was no chance for his employer and friend.

"We were under attack by the Minotaur." He wiped away more blood that had appeared on his lip, staggered a few steps further. "We were under attack by the Minotaur, with no escape. And that thing was invincible. The ritual can't be performed again until nightfall – there's no way she'll survive until then, even if it weren't for the fact that time there is different. Usually it runs faster – by the time I get back to her she could have been stuck there weeks."

"That's why it's dawning already," Maria realised. "The time dilation must have leaked through the doorway."

"I don't understand," Bryce complained wearily. "How can it kill her if she's already dead? And why did you leave her down there with it?"

"Down there, your body is dead but your soul is still alive – and if that gets killed…"

"You're gone forever," Maria said to herself.

"You didn't answer his question," Hillary derided, his eyes narrowing. "Why did you leave her down there like that?"

"I had no choice. She went back to save Fishman from the Minotaur and I got sucked through the gate before I could stop her."

At his words, Maria looked up hopefully. "Gareth's down there?"

Kurtis didn't answer, just looked at the girl sympathetically and then looked away when he couldn't hold the eye contact any longer. Maria choked back a sob, her hand covering her mouth in sick terror.

"He's gone," she whimpered. "Isn't he?"

"Maria," Kurtis began, taking a step towards her, but she interrupted him, her voice angry this time.

"Isn't he!"

"The last I saw…the Minotaur had him."

It was too much for Maria – bursting into tears she turned and ran, tearing across the dig site and scrambling up a ladder to floor-level before disappearing further into the building, her sobs echoing through the vast stone corridors.

"You…" Bryce began, his face sneering in contempt, but he could find no insult to follow. He took one angry step towards Trent, his posture a pure threat backing up his murderous gaze. His voice became tightly controlled as he said, "Hillary. Go and find Maria. Mr Trent and I are going to have a little talk about our possibilities."

Hillary knew full well that a fight was brewing, but his concern was for the young girl who had just lost her surrogate father, and so, silently praying that Lara could hold on until they could get to her, he turned and ran off in search of Maria.

"What thehell she sees in you, I have no idea," Bryce spat, coming to stand too close in front of Kurtis, who held his ground with a slightly sheepish expression.

"Look," he breathed. "I'm sorry – "

"Sorry! SORRY! You don't phone, you don't write, it's her birthday and all you can do is send her a present without even a note that you _know_ is going to leave her hanging on and then when you do finally turn up all you do is drag her into your mess and leave her to be butchered by – "

"Bryce." Kurtis's voice was low, his eyes suddenly steely. "Bryce, think very hard. Was Lara wearing the necklace?"

Cut off in the middle of his tirade, Bryce was suitably taken aback. "What?"

"The necklace, the Eye of Horus that I sent Lara for her birthday. Was she wearing it when we went to the underworld?"

"Um…yeah. She said that in her line of work she'd take all the help she could get."

"That's it." A look of wonder and joy crossed Kurtis' face. "Bryce, that's it! The necklace! You've saved her! You just saved Lara!"

He darted around his stunned colleague, sprinting off up the dig site ladder and down towards the exit. "Come on!" he yelled, "we have to get to the river!"


	15. Reunion

**Whoo hoo a proper update at last!**

**Akkon - Umm..sorry, did I keep you waiting long? ;-)  
SilverDragon 67 - Thanks for the critique of the original chapter 14. :-) It helped a lot with my rewrite.  
Odd Little Turtle - Here's your update at long last! Sorry about the wait.  
LostandConfused - Thanks! I hope I'm not offending you or anyone else with any of the religious aspects in this story.  
Mystique1515 - Don't worry, you didn't miss anything - until now, no-one knew who the other Lara was. Actually, even after this, it's still not totally clear - I'm leaving it up to the reader to decide.  
NFI - Of course it wasa cliffhanger! What else do you expect from me? ;-)  
theharshlightofday - Hee Hee, if you like Bryce and Kurtis fighting, you'll like the last chapter...  
lara-is-my-rolemodel - Here's your update, you can stop poking me now!  
spitfire511 - Nope, nowhere near another six months. Thanks!**

**Thanks for the reviews, everybody! Always appreciated. :-)**

**As a reminder after my six month delay, Lara has been left trapped in the underworld under attack from a Minotaur, but Mysterious Dream Lara chick has just shown up to save the day and send dead fellow raider Gareth Fishman onto his next life according to his belief in Heaven. Kurtis, Bryce, Hillary and Gareth's protege Maria nearly wrote Lara off due to the imminent attack of the Minotaur and the fact that the ritual that could allow Kurtis to rescue her can only be performed at night, but Bryce unintentionally reminded Kurtis that Lara had been wearing the Eye of Horus necklace - a protection amulet according Egyptian mythology - that he sent her for her birthday. Meanwhile, Travis Sunderland - who kidnapped Kurtis in an attempt to drink from the Styx to gain immortality in order to escape from his terminal illness - has returned from the afterlife but still hasn't managed to drink from the waters. **

_Reunion_

As a white light engulfed Gareth Fishman, spiriting him away to his next life like rising ash from luminous flames, Lara screwed her eyes shut against the brightness and turned her head away. As quickly as the light had appeared, it faded, and Lara looked back up to see, through recovering vision, the Minotaur faltering under the unexpected flash. It snorted, hooved the ground, and then charged again.

Just as Lara was about to react, She stepped in front of her, standing Her ground calmly, unafraid. The bull got closer and closer, hot breath escaping noisily in short, fast pants.

* * *

With Lara's body laid safely behind the rear seats, the Jeep sped along the roads back towards the river, the sun rising steadily in the sky casting the vehicle in shadows and patches of blinding light as it caught the dawn. 

"What are we going to do? Are you opening the gate again?" It was Sunderland, still dripping wet and now squashed into a corner of the back seat of the Jeep nervously after having slunk along the walls after the rest of the group after his return from the underworld.

"Yes," said Kurtis at the wheel, "we're going to open the gate again."

Maria, slumped miserably between Sunderland and Bryce, spoke, her voice small and quiet. "I hope you're not too late."

Bryce looked over at her, the sympathy etched onto his face enhanced with appreciation for her selfless comment. "I'm sorry about Fishman," he said.

"Maria, he was a good man," Kurtis offered, eyeing her gingerly in the rear view mirror. "He could have come back but it was his time and he accepted that."

Maria leant forward, suddenly intent. "I thought you said the Minotaur killed him?"

Kurtis glanced at Sunderland in his wing mirror, who quickly looked to his lap. "The Minotaur was attacking him when I was sucked through the doorway, yeah."

"I don't understand." Maria's face was hard, accusing Kurtis of tainting Fishman's memory with lies.

"This is our turning," Hillary interrupted from the front passenger seat, and Kurtis, quickly brought back to attention and saved from answering, swung the car right.

"Maria," Bryce said gently, "no-one's trying to hide from you what happened to Fishman, but we have to think about Lara first, whilst she still has a chance."

"Well according to him, Gareth might still have one too!" Maria shot back angrily.

"I didn't say that!" Kurtis protested. "Look, when I left him he was in a real bad – "

"We are _not_ giving up on him as long as there's a chance!"

"He didn't go down there alive, Maria," Hillary said.

"I don't care!"

"Maria," Kurtis said, his voice harsh and demanding her to be quiet, "whether he's 'alive' down there or not, he's not coming back. He said it himself. Now I will gladly tell you everything when the time's right, but right now I have Lara to think about. Ok?" He brought the Jeep to an abrupt halt upon the river's bank, and leapt out, tearing over the muddy uneven ground to the water's edge.

"ANUBIS!" Kurtis bellowed, slipping as he skidded on the mud at the edge of the bank. "ANUBIS!"

Behind him the others followed, gingerly hurrying over the mud brought on by recent rainstorms that had plagued the area since Lara had been lost. "I thought the ritual could only be done at night," Hillary called. "It's only just dawning!"

"I'm not doing the ritual," Kurtis threw over his shoulder. There was a hint of derision in his voice that Hillary didn't think was directed at him.

"ANUBIS!" Kurtis cried again. "Anubis! Keeper of the dead! By the power of the Lux Veritatis I command you to appear!"

A lashing of rain immediately took up again, the skies opening to an instantaneous pelting of heavy raindrops that splashed into the shallow pools already present in the pitted earth and smashed the surface of the river into a million tiny shards of liquid glass. Thunder broke the air and lightening forked across the landscape.

The group turned towards the estuary and the sea further out, waiting for Anubis to rise from the churning waters. Sure enough the surface began to bubble and then rose upwards, waves crashing down around the glistening onyx body of the jackal headed god.

"Who commands me?" Whereas the voice before was gentle under the booming omnipotence, this time it was venomous and malevolent, cowing everyone except Kurtis who stood his ground and stared back defiantly.

"I do!"

"Perform the proper ritual and bow before me in respect or I will extinguish you all."

"Open the gates!" Kurtis shouted up at the imposing, massive presence with false courage. "Let Lara through!"

"It is not my duty to sort the living from the dead, only to guard those who have entered the realm of Osiris and even if it were, you cannot order me. Bow!"

Maria, Bryce, Hillary and Sunderland shrunk back under the spat order, gasping in terror and dropping to their knees, oblivious to the mud as they clung onto each other. Kurtis, visibly shaking, set his jaw and took one step forward.

"Then you will die!" Anubis thundered. His body became rigid and he raised his face skywards, the clouds above blackening even further. The air crackled with electricity and, tearing the atmosphere apart, a thunderbolt struck downwards directly at Kurtis. Having sensed what was about to happen, he dived forwards, the lightening missing him by inches. He fell, limbs flailing, into the river, coughing and spluttering as he surfaced and fighting to stay afloat in the churning waters.

The others ran forwards, clustering together on the edge of the bank, reaching out to him in a desperate attempt to pull him back onto land, but Anubis' presence had brought turbulent currents to the flow and Kurtis couldn't fight his way through them.

"She's wearing the Eye of Horus!" Kurtis screamed over the din of the storm. "That means she's protected! You have to honour that!"

The god stared down at Kurtis, tiny in comparison as he was tossed about by the currents. "Her protection does not grant her the right to a rebirth."

"It grants her the right to continue living when she's not supposed to be dead, and it grants her the right to safety, and she is in danger down there!"

Anubis did not respond.

* * *

In Hades, the Minotaur charged on, drawing ever closer, and Lara's breathing quickened as she stared at Her, seemingly doing nothing more than awaiting Her fate.

* * *

Kurtis screamed up at the uncaring deity. "You fail to protect her whilst she's in your realm and you answer to Horus!" 

Anubis still did not respond, but continued to stare down at Kurtis. The moments passed, Kurtis fighting for air against the splashing, choking waters and the others staring fearfully up at Anubis, hearts racing as they waited for his decision.

At last, the god bowed his head, and the waters, already raging, began to bubble.

* * *

At the last possible moment, She thrust a flattened palm out towards the beast. "Stop!" 

Lara started at the sudden shout, gasping as the bull obeyed. It snorted again, alarmed, and skidded to a halt, leaning back against its momentum as broken shale flew from the path of its hooves and chinked and broke underneath as the animal's steps clattered violently until it eventually managed to halt just inches from Her. It stood, breathing heavily with its nostrils flaring, the frighteningly wild stare in its eyes fixed directly on Her. Mouth set defiantly, She stepped forwards to run a hand over its muscled flanks, leaving Lara to stand gaping from the ordeal from which she had just been rescued.

"Shhh," She calmed, stroking the Minotaur's snout, Her voice a whisper. "Stay with me, now. I'll get you back to your creator."

"As for you," She said, her voice harder and louder as she turned towards Minos, "you will also be going back to the elder Gods. They gave you your powers in the underworld and they can take them away again. They'll decide what to do with you."

He stepped towards Her, opening his arms entreatingly. "But my intentions were good!"

"At first, maybe. But they quickly degraded."

"I'll stay! I can save my people – "

"Only the Gods can save them now. It's time for you to go."

"No. No! You can't!" Minos panicked, terrified at the prospect of finally being judged.

"I can and I will." She and Minos stared at each other, Minos' gaze of fear met with one of derision. Raising one arm slowly, She casually flicked a finger. Minos and the Minotaur vanished.

She turned back to Lara, smiling. "It's almost time. They're coming for you."

Lara's face was written with confusion. "Who's coming for me?"

"Your friends."

"They're coming back to get me?"

"Of course they're coming back for you!"

* * *

Seeing the bubbling waters of the stix, tantalising him with the promise of immortality once again, the terminally ill Sunderland scrambled forwards, laughing as he stretched his arms downwards to the water to cup it within his hands.

"Stop him!" Kurtis yelled, fighting forwards towards the land once again.

Obediently Hillary pounced upon the prone man, wrestling him away from the waters and fending off struggling punches and kicks from the determined Travis.

"Hang on!" Bryce shouted to Kurtis, gaining an idea. He ran off towards the Jeep, scrabbling around in the back and returning moments later with a towrope. Taking one end he hurled the other out across the river and Kurtis caught it, hauling himself towards the land as Bryce and Maria leant back against his weight.

"Help!" Hillary called. "Help me!" With desperation on his side, Travis was winning and was now on top as he and Hillary brawled, their holds on each other tenuous in the slippery mud.

"Maria, go," Bryce grunted, struggling to hold the rope as the turbulent river threatened to wash Kurtis away. She did so, running over to the fight and falling to her knees as she yanked Sunderland off Hillary and scratched viciously at his face.

"Hold on!" Kurtis begged Bryce, calling on every reserve of strength he could find to pull himself up the rope before the other man lost his rapidly waning grip.

* * *

"But…who are you?" Lara asked as She walked towards her.

"You don't know?"

Lara shook her head slowly, her gaze never leaving the other woman's eyes.

"Remember," She said, smiling. "Remember the darkness. Remember the exhaustion, the pain, and the freezing cold. Von Croy thought he'd found you but he was too late. The tribe had found you, taken you, healed you – but not until after you'd closed your eyes that one moment too long."

Lara's voice faltered. "I…I don't understand."

"Yes, you do."

Lara watched as She continued to walk slowly towards her, and she gasped. Her double's image was flickering, jumping, as though She was a picture on a badly tuned television, but that wasn't all. Through the flickering picture of Her dressed in Lara's old tomb raiding clothes of brown shorts and green top was a slightly different likeness, one where the outfit was torn and ripped, where dust and dirt caked the material and where Her grimy skin was cut and bloodied, Her arm bent awkwardly in the tell tale sign of a break. As She came to rest in front of Lara, Her image settled into the macabre picture of Lara on the brink of death. "You do remember," She said.

"Where are they?" Lara whimpered, her face beginning to crumple as she fought back tears. "When are they coming?"

She smiled. "Right now. It's time to go home." She opened Her arms, holding them wide for Lara to enter into an embrace. "Let's go."

Giving in to the tears, Lara stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Herself. Everything went white.

* * *

Laraawoke to find herself lying uncomfortably squashed into the back of a Jeep, gasping in lungfuls of overdue air and wiping away droplets of water that ran into her eyes and dripped across her chest from her sodden hair. Gasping, frightened, she stared around to find the car empty and the hatchback closed with no-one in sight. A storm was raging outside, pelting the windows and drumming on the roof. Whimpering with the memories of her ordeal fresh in her mind, she managed to clumsily clamber over the seats and open the door, falling out into the rain.

There were desperate shouts nearby and she falteringly got to her feet, eventually managing to stagger away from the vehicle and around to the other side.

She was on the riverbank, the river still churning and bubbling as it had when she had seen it last. Hillary and Maria were frantically fighting against Sunderland, rolling over and over in the mud and scratching and clawing at each other, whilst Bryce was clutching onto a rope, Kurtis clinging onto the other end and struggling against the pull of the watery gateway that threatened to sweep him away again.

"I'm alive again," she whispered, and then sheer joy began to wipe away the numb shock on her face. "I'm alive again!"

Anubis looked up, and, seeing her there, did nothing more than fade away. The rain abated, the waters calmed, and the skies cleared. Distracted by the sudden loss of the roaring waters and bombarding raindrops, the three clashing on the bank stopped, staring around in confusion, as did Bryce as Kurtis, similarly stunned, just trod water.

Being the only one facing in her direction, his eyes fell on her first.

"Lara!"


	16. Visibility

**Whoo hoo! My second big fanfic is finished! Too bad it's planted seeds of sequels in my head...I'll never get a rest! LOL**

**Sorry about there being no responses to you reviewers of the last chapter - I've been told it's now against policy and you know what TPTB around here are like...there were responses here, but I've had to play it safe and delete them. Any reviews given in future will almost certainly receive a PM via the new feature instead. **

_Visibility_

"Lara!" The name was uttered several times almost simultaneously as, alerted by Kurtis, pairs of eyes turned to search her out.

"Lara, you're alright!" Bryce dropped the rope he'd been using to pull Kurtis to safety, leaving him to swim his way through the now-calm waters, and tore, stumbling and slipping in the mud, across the bank to Lara.

She was dripping wet, shivering from cold, and dazed as Bryce reached her, taking hold of her arms and trying to grab her distracted attention. "Are you ok? Lara? Lara!"

Lara only managed to nod weakly as Hillary, delayed by having to disentangle himself from Sunderland, slid to her side, voicing his own concern as he yanked her sodden jacket away and started removing Bryce's from off his shoulders to give to her. "We should get back to the hotel or you'll get pneumonia. Both of you," Hillary fussed, directing the last part at Kurtis as he and Maria jogged up, the girl having waited to help him up the bank. The butler began to usher Lara towards the Jeep but she pulled away and looked over at Sunderland, slumped by the river.

"What about him?"

Kurtis followed her gaze, his expression hardening again. "Sunderland!" he called harshly, starting off towards him. "Get your ass over here!" Sunderland didn't answer. He was kneeling on the bank in the mud, oblivious to the earth that caked his expensive clothes, staring, unmoving, at the river.

"Sunderland," Kurtis said again, stopping at his side and looking down at him unsympathetically. "I said get up. We're leaving."

"I'm going to die," Travis said quietly, helplessly. "I'm going to die."

"Yeah. You are."

"It's your fault!" Sunderland suddenly leapt to his feet, turning and laying into Kurtis with uncoordinated fists and feet, angry at the world and almost crying. "It's your fault!"

"Alright!" Kurtis shouted, fending him off without returning the blows. "Cool it!"

Sunderland gave up, suddenly exhausted, and fell to his knees again. "You took away my only chance," he complained. "You won't open the gate again. Not for me. Why did you do it? Why? Was it revenge? I mean…" He looked up at Trent pleadingly.

"You told me cigarettes would kill me. You've got cancer, right?" Sunderland nodded, dropping his eyes as a tear fell to the thin grass. "It's your time, Sunderland. People aren't supposed to be immortal. Drinking the Styx is not the answer. Facing up to your fate and living life whilst you're still well enough _is_."

"What the hell do you know?" Sunderland cried. "What do you know?"

"You've got it all wrong, Sunderland," Lara said gently, appearing behind Kurtis. "It's living you should be afraid of, not dying. Trust me, I know."

"You don't have cancer!"

"But I have died. Alone, cold, in pain, with regrets. You have time to make sure it isn't like that for you. And you have proof right there," Lara continued, pointing to the river that glistened gold in the rising sun, "that it's not the end." She knelt, placing a hand on his. "It's time to stop hiding."

Travis raised his face, tears still falling quietly. His eyes flicked to Kurtis and then away again. "I'm sorry," he said. Then he got up and walked to the Jeep.

Kurtis folded his arms and turned to watch Sunderland walk away. "He didn't deserve that," he said to Lara, his voice cold.

"You didn't stop me."

Kurtis didn't reply, so she set off behind Sunderland.

* * *

Lara's hotel room door was opened to reveal her in a bath robe, still towelling off her hair after a shower. "Maria," she said. "What can I do for you?" 

"Gareth," Maria said firmly. "No-one will tell me what happened to him."

Lara nodded, the towel slowing. She said nothing, just stepped back to allow Maria to enter.

"Gareth…really proved himself down there."

"What. Happened?" Maria reiterated, folding her arms and standing in the middle of the room.

"It wasn't nice down there," Lara said simply, sitting on the bed and gesturing for Maria to join her. "Gareth saved Sunderland from some bad people, walked us back to the spot where Kurtis could open the gate again… someone wanted Gareth to stay to fight a war and when he refused, the Minotaur was set on us. Down there, you can die again and if you do, your soul dies. The Minotaur was about to get Sunderland when Gareth pushed him out of the way and took the attack instead. I went back for him and that's when Kurtis was sucked through the gateway. Then…then we managed to kill the Minotaur and Gareth went on to the heaven he believed in."

Maria was disbelieving, incensed. "But why didn't he come back with you?"

"Because he knew he shouldn't."

"Oh so he just left me here alone?" Maria shouted, jumping up and turning angrily on Lara. "Just left me, just like that?"

"He wasn't supposed to come back!" Lara retorted, raising her voice to shout the young woman down and standing, rising above Maria in her taller stature. "Getting shot was his time!"

Maria stared back for a moment, eyes darting and her expression suggesting tears just under the surface. "So that's it then? He's just gone."

"Yes," Lara nodded, her voice quiet. Maria's head slowly bowed. "Maria," Lara continued, slightly at a loss as to what to say, "maybe this is a good time for you to strike out on your own and work for yourself. Gareth trained you well, I can tell. You probably don't feel ready but, in this game, no-one does."

"No," said Maria, turning and walking to the door. "I think that maybe tomb raiding isn't for me." She reached out to lower the door handle but stopped when Lara called out to her.

"Gareth was very proud of you. He said to tell you that."

Maria opened the door and left.

* * *

Bryce's phone rang. 

"Hello?…Akira, hi!…No, I've not been away. At least, I don't think I have…are you sure?…really?…wow…_really_! That's great news! Brilliant! Next week…yeah…ok. See ya, Akira! Say hi to Takeshi for me."

He hung up, scribbled some dates and times down on a nearby notepad, and dashed next door to Hillary's room.

"Mate! You know how all the reception staff were giving us really weird looks when we came back this morning?"

"Yes," sighed Hillary, putting aside his copy of The Independent that he'd bought in the lobby, giving up on getting any reading done whilst Bryce was around.

"Well, according to Akira – you know, Takeshi's friend from Japan? – apparently I haven't been answering my e-mails and my mobile phone has been completely off the radar, and he's been trying to get hold of me for over a week!"

"A week?" Hillary replied, confused. "But we only left the hotel last night!"

"Slower time must have crept through the gateway, like Maria said. For us it was one night, for everyone else it was one week. We must have been out of phase or something, which is why the archaeologists didn't see us and we didn't see them."

"No. No," said Hillary, reaching for his newspaper. "There must be a – " He stopped himself mid-sentence as his eyes fell on the hitherto unnoticed date at the top of the page. "Nine days," he breathed. "Nine days?"

"Wow," said Bryce simply, apparently over the shock already. "Look, er, Maria's probably going to want a shoulder to cry on so, er…I'm off…anyway, I need to come up with an excuse to get Lara to send me to Tokyo next week. Got to see a certain games company about a certain new games franchise with a certain Japanese business partner."

"Don't you take advantage," Hillary warned.

"I've already done that, don't you think?"

"I _meant_ with Maria."

Bryce smiled, dropping the joke. "Wouldn't dream of it."

* * *

The next morning, Kurtis rubbed his forehead tiredly as another sob floated out of one of the bedrooms of a suite in a different hotel that Sunderland's party had booked into upon their arrival in Ukraine. Before, it had been Kurtis' prison. Now, it was just as depressing, for different reasons. With Harding dead and Sunderland's two guards apparently becoming deserters after the fire fight on the bank, it was large and empty, quiet save for the sound of Sunderland's misery. 

Kurtis rose from the sofa where he'd been sitting most of the night, feeling the effects of not sleeping deep within his head, in the beginnings of a migraine. He crossed to the French doors that opened out onto the balcony and stepped out into the cold air, closing his eyes and lifting his face to the chill breeze as he allowed it to wake him up. He took a cigarette and a lighter from his pocket and lit up.

Soft footsteps trod across the thick carpet indoors and then became harder as they joined him on the concrete balcony. "Couldn't sleep?" asked Lara's soft voice.

"Nah," Kurtis grinned.

"Me neither." There was a comfortable silence as they both looked out over the town before Lara spoke again. "We're all waiting in the lobby. When you're ready, we'll go. Your plane lands at Norfolk Airport. Bryce didn't book you any airport transfers though, because we don't know exactly where you live."

"I have to go back to Virginia already?" Kurtis asked with a small laugh, turning to her. "We haven't even celebrated your birthday yet. At least let me come back to England with you and take you to one of those quaint little pubs you guys have."

Lara laughed at his comment. "Kurtis, you're more than welcome to come whenever you want, you know that. Bryce can change your ticket, I'm sure."

"I'll pay you back when I get hold of my cheque book again. All I've got here is two tiny little bags with a couple of changes of clothes, my passport and my weapons. Sunderland's guys weren't exactly thorough when they broke into my place to get my travel documents, you know?" There was another pause and then, "God, I hope they didn't leave my front door open."

Lara laughed again. "How's Sunderland?" she asked.

"Not good. He'll deal, eventually. For now, he's a wreck. I hear Maria's quit the business. Running away from things, isn't she?"

Lara sighed, nodding, and leant her hands on the railing. "There'll be trouble there. Just you wait."

Kurtis gave her a sideways look. "You think?"

"Oh yes." Lara slapped her hands on the railing and pushed her weight back onto her feet. "Well, I'll be in the lobby. Come down when you're ready." She handed back the keycard to the suite that Kurtis had given her and turned to leave.

"Lara?" Trent called over his shoulder. "What happened to the Helmet?"

Lara smiled, stopping and turning towards him. "I still had it with me when I was brought out of the Underworld, but it was gone when I woke up. I assume she didn't let me keep it."

"Who didn't?"

Lara opened her mouth to speak, smiled to hide her mistake, and then decided what to say. "Oh…nobody. Just a figure of speech. Anyway, I think we're all a lot better off without that Helmet, don't you?" She smiled again. "See you in the lobby."

Kurtis Trent leant on the hotel balcony railing and stared out across the town. He took a drag of his cigarette, breathing in deeply, and then exhaled. The smoke mingled with the early morning fog, already shrouding the skyline into ghosts of silhouettes.

He thought for a moment, contemplating all that he had been through, all that had happened, finalising his thoughts that had been running all night.

"They say still waters run deep," he concluded to no one but himself. "I guess they're right."

Then he dropped his cigarette on the floor, stamped it out under his boot, and went inside to pick up his bags.

As he passed Sunderland's open door, another sob caught his attention. Travis was on his knees, distraught.

Kurtis removed his pistol from where it was tucked down into his waistband. He levelled it squarely at Travis' head. His finger put a slight pressure on the trigger.

Then he let out a sharp, heavy breath, shoved the gun back into his trousers, and marched out.

THE END

**Well, that was at times difficult, but totally worth it. Sometimes it frustrated me but overall I really enjoyed writing this whole story and I'm glad that so many of you have apparently enjoyed reading it just as much.**

**Thanks to - **

**Akkon, for reminding me that Minos wasn't just a person I knew, he was also the guy whose wife had the Minotaur. A big part of the story was thanks to you.**

**The show La Femme Nikita for yet more inspiration.**

**The video game Silent Hill 2, for being a source for homages!**

**Simple Minds, whose song 'Don't You Forget About Me' inspired Kurtis' crush, Jennifer (gee, guess what my name is, people!)**

**Everyone who helped with No Man's Land, since it was the source of several 'injokes' in this story.**

**Core Design and the creators of Hillary and Bryce, who gave me these wonderful characters to work with.**

**Last but not least, my wonderful readers and reviewers. Love you all! Mwah!**

**No profit was made, I just really, really enjoyed writing this.**


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